Breaking Through: My Life in Science

A story of perseverance and the power of convictions from the groundbreaking immigrant scientist whose decades-long research led to the COVID-19 vaccines, hailed as "an inspiration" by Bill Gates "A riveting testament to resilience and the power of unwavering belief."--Jennifer Doudna, Nobel Prize laureate in chemistry and author of A Crack in Creation Katalin Karikó has had an unlikely journey. The daughter of a butcher in postwar communist Hungary, Karikó grew up in an adobe home that lacked running water, and her family grew their own vegetables. She saw the wonders of nature all around her and was determined to become a scientist. That determination eventually brought her to the United States, where she arrived as a postdoctoral fellow in 1985 with $1,200 sewn into her toddler's teddy bear and a dream to remake medicine. Karikó worked in obscurity, battled cockroaches in a windowless lab, and faced outright derision and even deportation threats from her bosses and colleagues. Sh