European Patent EP3287525B1, another mRNA-related patent listing Karikó as inventor, was granted by the EPO.
On July 10, 2019, the European Patent Office granted European Patent EP3287525B1, adding to Katalin Karikó's expanding portfolio of European mRNA-related patents.
This patent, like its predecessors, protected specific technical advances in the use of nucleoside-modified RNA, reinforcing the intellectual property foundation that would prove indispensable only months later when the COVID-19 pandemic created urgent global demand for rapidly developed vaccines.
At the time of this grant, few outside specialist scientific and patent circles were aware of the significance of this body of work. Karikó continued her research at BioNTech largely outside mainstream public attention, even as her decades of persistence began to bear fruit within the biotechnology industry.
Within a year of this patent's grant, BioNTech partnered with Pfizer to develop the first authorized mRNA COVID-19 vaccine using this patented technology, transforming what had been a niche area of biochemistry into one of the most celebrated scientific achievements of the 21st century, and elevating Karikó from relative obscurity to global recognition.