Moderna developed the MRNA-1273 COVID-19 vaccine with the U.S. National Institutes of Health.
The vaccine was later marketed as Moderna’s Spikevax. It uses messenger RNA, or mRNA, to instruct cells to make a harmless version of the coronavirus spike protein, prompting an immune response. The vaccine was developed rapidly because Moderna had already spent years working on mRNA technology.
Moderna collaborated with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health. The first participant in its phase 1 clinical trial was dosed in March 2020, only weeks after the SARS-CoV-2 genome had been shared publicly.
The vaccine is sometimes confused with the Pfizer–BioNTech vaccine because both use mRNA technology. They are separate products developed by different partnerships. Moderna’s vaccine received emergency authorization in the United States in December 2020.