Katalin Karikó is a professor at University of Szeged and adjunct professor at the University of Pennsylvania. From 2013 to 2022 she was a senior vice president at BioNTech. Prior to BioNTech, she worked for 24 years at the University of Pennsylvania. For decades, her research has been focusing on RNA-mediated mechanisms with the goal of developing in vitro-transcribed mRNA for therapy. She co-founded and served as CEO of RNARx. Her patents co-invented with Drew Weissman on nucleoside-modified uridines in mRNA were used to create the FDA-approved COVID-19 mRNA vaccines by BioNTech/Pfizer and Moderna. For her achievement, Karikó received many prestigious awards, including the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.