More than 100 products have been created thanks to the innovations of Robert Langer, who co-founded Moderna. The 73-year-old has a mountain of research papers and patents to his name, on top of which he has started more than 40 companies and won more than 200 awards. More than 100 researchers are employed by the lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He spoke to the Observer to mark the World Engineering Day.
You made Forbes magazine's billionaires list last year. Being a co-founder of Moderna has been profitable. It's embarrassing. How did it feel? Everyone sees it. I have never sold a Moderna share, so it's not like I'm spending the money. I didn't do this to get rich. I have never sought high paying jobs. I've looked for things that I thought would make a difference all my life.
When you set up Moderna in 2010, did you think it would be a success? I thought the platform was revolutionary and I thought we could do it. I told my wife that Moderna would be the most successful company in history. The Covid-19 vaccine accelerated the company's success, but we were only able to make it because of the underlying technology we had already developed.
You were raised in Albany, New York. Your mum took care of you and your sister when your dad ran a liquor store. My parents bought me a Gilbert hobby set that included a chemistry one. I set up a lab in the basement that I loved making the colors change. I did well in math in high school, though I didn't like chemistry. I was told to do engineering at college. I decided to major in chemical engineering because I did poorly in chemistry in my first year at Cornell.
You did your PhD in chemical engineering at MIT, but didn't follow your classmates into high paying jobs in the oil industry, and so you declined the job offers. I got a position doing cancer research after many unanswered letters. It was in the lab of Judah Folkman, a professor and surgeon at Boston children's hospital, known for his unusual hires. It changed my life. I was the only engineer in the hospital. I began to think about how materials got into medicine. The basis of a breast implant and an artificial heart would be made from ladies' material. Design the material you wanted from the first principles.
Moderna and Pfizer's Covid-19 vaccines are different from previous vaccines in that they teach our cells how to make an immune response. Being the first person to deliver nucleic acids via tiny particles was your specific contribution to the technology. Folkman had the idea that if you could stop the formation of blood vessels inside a tumours, that could be a new way to treat cancer. To solve the problem, we had to deliver large molecule to the body. We were told it was impossible because the molecule were too big to travel through a capsule or particle and fragile to be placed inside them. I made tiny particles that could deliver just about anything. The findings were published in 1976.
I’m excited about all these possible new treatments. If personalised cancer vaccines work, that’ll be a big deal
I couldn't get grants or a position in an engineering department, but scientists thought I could make other types of tiny particles and deliver other macromolecules. The first blood vessel inhibitor to treat cancer was launched in 2004 by Genentech using techniques started in Folkman's lab.
Drug delivery technology that you pioneered is being used today, where else? Lots of people have built on the work we started, coming up with different applications and improvements. Microparticles are used to treat a number of mental health diseases. Our work has been important in the development of drug-eluting stents. Cancer and rare diseases are being treated with particles.
Moderna is developing medicines for a wide range of diseases. There are clinical trials for a flu and an HIV vaccine. Do you think a lot of them will succeed, and what are you most excited about? Over time, I expect you will see more success because there will be other companies and more trials. I'm excited about all the new treatments. If cancer vaccines work, that will be a big deal.
You are a pioneer in the field of tissue engineering. The idea of making three-dimensional scaffolds that you could put different kinds of cell types on to make tissues and organs came up in the early 1980s. We've created blood vessels and artificial skin for burn victims, as well as many other tissues and organs. New materials that cells adhere to better have been made by us.
Moderna is one of the drug companies that is trying to get Covid-19 vaccines to poorer nations. Both the drug companies and the governments are doing the best they can, despite the criticism from Covax. The companies are increasing their manufacturing capacity. Moderna is working to set up a plant in Africa. It also said that it will never enforce its Covid-19-related patents in low- and middle-income countries. The problem is not about having enough vaccines, but getting them into people's arms. It's a challenge. The African Union had an option to acquire 60m doses from Moderna.
Moderna is in a patent dispute with the US National Institutes of Health over whether three scientists should be credited for finding the genetic sequence that is central to the vaccine. I don't think this will end up in court because the company has backed down in the hopes of reaching an agreeable resolution. The patent has been offered by Moderna. I think that Moderna is very fond of working with theNIH. We are working together. The relationship has been a win for both of us.
In 2005 I agreed to get involved in starting Living Proof, a hair and skin care company. One goal was to prevent hair loss. We took a fundamental look and found that these are already approved for other uses. To give hair more body was a second aim. Some new gene therapy agents were led to by the repurposing of polymers we had already developed. In 2016 we spun off the skin care part of Living Proof to Shiseido.
One of the biggest areas of work is with the Gates Foundation on creating new technologies for the developing world. We are working on a new approach to vaccines where you just give a single injection with nanoparticles or microparticles and it will deliver the vaccine by popping at different months, so you get the boosters too. We licensed our previous work on long-acting oral pills to a new company. A contraceptive pill designed to be given once a month should be going into clinical trials soon. We are trying to create materials that don't get fibrotic, and we are working on delivery systems to get different types ofRNA and Crispr inside cells.
Is engineering cheap? It depends on the country, but science and engineering in the United States doesn't get as much respect as I would like to see. I think it's important to stress how engineers have changed the world for the better. Engineering and biology improving people's lives has been my dream since I was a child.
Do you have any advice for young people interested in an engineering career? It's ok to fail and take risks. Diverse background is a plus. It's better to solve big problems if more people come at them with different perspectives.
You are known for exercising a lot. My dad died of a heart attack at 61 and I have a tendency towards high cholesterol. I want to be here for my family. I work out for two or three hours a day. I have been walking the whole time we have been talking.
The Royal Academy of Engineering website has a new series of short films featuring engineering heroes.
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