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SING MESSENGER RNA to make vaccines was an unproven idea. But if it worked, the technique would revolutionise medicine, not least by providing protection against infectious diseases and biological weapons. So in 2013 America’s Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (
DARPA) gambled. It awarded a small, new firm called Moderna $25m to develop the idea. Eight years, and more than 175m doses later, Moderna’s covid-19 vaccine sits alongside weather satellites,
GPS, drones, stealth technology, voice interfaces, the personal computer and the internet on the list of innovations for which
DARPA can claim at least partial credit.
It is the agency that shaped the modern world, and this success has spurred imitators. In America there are