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Early mrna research that led to covid-19 vaccines wins 2023 medicine nobel prize.

Biochemists Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman overcame hurdles that enabled vaccine development

Researchers Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman discovered how to deliver mRNA into cells inside the body by enveloping the molecule inside lipid bubbles (illustrated). Technology that was essential for developing some COVID-19 vaccines earned the pair the 2023 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine. 

JUAN GAERTNER/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/GETTY IMAGES

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By Tina Hesman Saey , Meghan Rosen and Erin Garcia de Jesús

October 2, 2023 at 9:29 am

Updated October 2, 2023 at 1:30 pm

Two scientists who laid the groundwork for what would become among the most influential vaccines of all time have been awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology. 

Biochemist Katalin Karikó, now at the University of Szeged in Hungary, and Drew Weissman of the University of Pennsylvania were honored for their research on modifications of mRNA that made the first vaccines against COVID-19 possible ( SN: 12/15/21 ). 

“Everybody has experienced the COVID-19 pandemic that affects our life, economy and public health. It was a traumatic event,” said Qiang Pan-Hammarström, a member of the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, which awards the medicine or physiology prize. Her remarks came on October 2 after a news briefing to announce the winners. “You probably don’t need to emphasize more that the basic discovery made by the laureates has made a huge impact on our society.”

As of September 2023, more than 13.5 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses — including mRNA vaccines as well as other kinds of shots — had been administered since they first became available in December 2020, according to the World Health Organization. In the year after their introduction, the shots are estimated to have saved nearly 20 million lives globally. In the United States, where mRNA COVID-19 shots made by Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech accounted for the vast majority of vaccinations, the vaccines are estimated to have prevented 1.1 million additional deaths and 10.3 million hospitalizations.

A different kind of vaccine

RNA is DNA’s lesser-known chemical cousin. Cells make RNA copies of genetic instructions contained in DNA. Some of those RNA copies, known as messenger RNA, or mRNA, are used to build proteins. Messenger RNA “literally tells your cells what proteins to make,” says Kizzmekia Corbett-Helaire, a viral immunologist at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston. Proteins do much of the important work that keeps cells, and the organisms they’re a part of, alive and well.

The mRNA vaccines work a bit differently than traditional immunizations. Most traditional vaccines use viruses or bacteria — either weakened or killed — or proteins from those pathogens to provoke the immune system into making protective antibodies and other defenses against future infections. 

The COVID-19 vaccines made by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna instead contain mRNA that carries instructions for making one of the coronavirus’s proteins ( SN: 2/21/20 ). When a person gets an mRNA shot, the genetic material gets into their cells and triggers the cells to produce the viral protein for a short amount of time. When the immune system sees the viral protein, it builds defenses to prevent serious illness if the person later gets infected with the coronavirus. 

Vaccines using mRNA were a good choice to combat the pandemic, Corbett-Helaire says. The technology allows scientists to “skip that step of making large amounts of proteins in the laboratory and instead … tell the body to do things that the body already does, except now we make an extra protein,” she says. 

In addition to protecting people from the coronavirus, mRNA vaccines may also work against other infectious diseases and cancer . Scientists might also use the technology to help people with certain rare genetic diseases make enzymes or other proteins they lack. Clinical trials are under way for many of these uses, but it could take years before scientists know the results ( SN: 12/17/21 ).

A long time coming

The first mRNA vaccine for COVID-19 became available just under a year into the pandemic, but the technology behind it has been decades in the making.

In 1997, Karikó and Weissman met at the copy machine, Karikó said during a news conference October 2 at the University of Pennsylvania. She told him about her work with RNA, and he shared his interest in vaccines. Although housed in separate buildings, the researchers worked together to solve one fundamental problem that could have derailed mRNA vaccines and therapies: Pumping regular mRNA into the body gets the immune system riled up in bad ways, producing a flood of immune chemicals called cytokines. Those chemicals can trigger damaging inflammation. And this unmodified mRNA produces very little protein in the body.  

The researchers found that swapping the RNA building block uridine for modified versions, first pseudouridine and then N1-methylpseudouridine, could dampen the bad immune reaction. That nifty chemistry, first reported in 2005 , allowed researchers to rein in the immune response and safely deliver the mRNA to cells.

“The messenger RNA has to hide and it has to go unnoticed by our bodies, which are very brilliant at destroying things that are foreign,” Corbett-Helaire says. “The modifications that [Karikó and Weissman] worked on for a number of years really were fundamental to allowing the mRNA therapeutics to hide while also being very helpful to the body.”

In addition, the modified mRNA produced lots of protein that could spark an immune response , the team showed in 2008 and 2010. It was this work on modifying mRNA building blocks that the prize honors.

For years, “we couldn’t get people to notice RNA as something interesting,” Weissman said at the Penn news conference. Vaccines using the technology failed clinical trials in the early 1990s, and most researchers gave up. But Karikó “lit the match,” and they spent the next 20 years figuring out how to get it to work, Weissman said. “We would sit together in 1997 and afterwards and talk about all the things that we thought RNA could do, all of the vaccines and therapeutics and gene therapies, and just realizing how important it had the potential to be. That’s why we never gave up.”

In 2006, Karikó and Weissman started a company called RNARx to develop mRNA-based treatments and vaccines. After Karikó joined the German company BioNTech in 2013, she and Weissman continued to collaborate. They and colleagues reported in 2015 that encasing mRNA in bubbles of lipids could help the fragile RNA get into cells without getting broken down in the body. The researchers were developing a Zika vaccine when the pandemic hit, and quickly applied what they had learned toward containing the coronavirus.

The duo’s work was not always so celebrated. Thomas Perlmann, Secretary General of the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute, asked the newly minted laureates whether they were surprised to have won. He said that Karikó was overwhelmed, noting that just 10 years ago she was terminated from her job and had to move to Germany without her family to get another position. She never won a grant from the U.S. National Institutes of Health to support her work. 

“She struggled and didn’t get recognition for the importance of her vision,” Perlmann said, but she had a passion for using mRNA therapeutically. “She resisted the temptation to sort of go away from that path and do something maybe easier.” Karikó is the 61st woman to win a Nobel Prize since 1901, and the 13th to be awarded a prize in physiology and medicine. 

Though it often takes decades before the Nobel committees recognize a discovery, sometimes recognition comes relatively swiftly. For instance, Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 2020 a mere eight years after the researchers published a description of the genetic scissors CRISPR/Cas 9 ( SN: 10/7/20 ).

“I never expected in my entire life to get the Nobel Prize,” Weissman said, especially not a mere three years after the vaccines demonstrated their medical importance. Perlmann told him the Nobel committee was seeking to be “more current” with its awards, he said.

The timely Nobel highlights that “there are just a million other possibilities for messenger RNA therapeutics … beyond the vaccines,” Corbett-Helaire says.

The researchers said at the Penn news conference that they weren’t sure the early morning phone call from Perlmann was real. On the advice of Weissman’s daughter, they waited for the Nobel announcement. “We sat in bed. [I was] looking at my wife, and my cat is begging for food,” he said. “We wait, and the press conference starts, and it was real. So that’s when we really became excited.”

Karikó and Weissman will share the prize of 11 million Swedish kronor, or roughly $1 million.

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FILE - In this May 25, 2017 file photo, chemotherapy drugs are administered to a patient at a hospital in Chapel Hill, N.C. Scaling back treatment in some cancers — ovarian, esophageal and Hodgkin lymphoma — can make life easier for patients without compromising outcomes, doctors reported at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting in early June 2024. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome, File)

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Scaling back treatment for three kinds of cancer can make life easier for patients without compromising outcomes, doctors reported at the world’s largest cancer conference.

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Students research pathways for MIT to reach decarbonization goals

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A number of emerging technologies hold promise for helping organizations move away from fossil fuels and achieve deep decarbonization. The challenge is deciding which technologies to adopt, and when.

MIT, which has a goal of eliminating direct campus emissions by 2050, must make such decisions sooner than most to achieve its mission. That was the challenge at the heart of the recently concluded class 4.s42 (Building Technology — Carbon Reduction Pathways for the MIT Campus).

The class brought together undergraduate and graduate students from across the Institute to learn about different technologies and decide on the best path forward. It concluded with a final report as well as student presentations to members of MIT’s Climate Nucleus on May 9.

“The mission of the class is to put together a cohesive document outlining how MIT can reach its goal of decarbonization by 2050,” says Morgan Johnson Quamina, an undergraduate in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. “We’re evaluating how MIT can reach these goals on time, what sorts of technologies can help, and how quickly and aggressively we’ll have to move. The final report details a ton of scenarios for partial and full implementation of different technologies, outlines timelines for everything, and features recommendations.”

The class was taught by professor of architecture Christoph Reinhart but included presentations by other faculty about low- and zero-carbon technology areas in their fields, including advanced nuclear reactors, deep geothermal energy, carbon capture, and more.

The students’ work served as an extension of MIT’s Campus Decarbonization Working Group , which Reinhart co-chairs with Director of Sustainability Julie Newman. The group is charged with developing a technology roadmap for the campus to reach its goal of decarbonizing its energy systems.

Reinhart says the class was a way to leverage the energy and creativity of students to accelerate his group’s work.

“It’s very much focused on establishing a vision for what could happen at MIT,” Reinhart says. “We are trying to bring these technologies together so that we see how this [decarbonization process] would actually look on our campus.”

A class with impact

Throughout the semester, every Thursday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m., around 20 students gathered to explore different decarbonization technology pathways. They also discussed energy policies, methods for evaluating risk, and future electric grid supply changes in New England.

“I love that this work can have a real-world impact,” says Emile Germonpre, a master’s student in the Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering. “You can tell people aren’t thinking about grades or workload — I think people would’ve loved it even if the workload was doubled. Everyone is just intrinsically motivated to help solve this problem.”

The classes typically began with an introduction to one of 10 different technologies. The introductions covered technical maturity, ease of implementation, costs, and how to model the technology’s impact on campus emissions. Students were then split into teams to evaluate each technology’s feasibility.

“I’ve learned a lot about decarbonization and climate change,” says Johnson Quamina. “As an undergrad, I haven’t had many focused classes like this. But it was really beneficial to learn about some of these technologies I hadn’t even heard of before. It’s awesome to be contributing to the community like this.”

As part of the class, students also developed a model that visualizes each intervention’s effect on emissions, allowing users to select interventions or combinations of interventions to see how they shape emissions trajectories.

“We have a physics-based model that takes into account every building,” says Reinhart. “You can look at variants where we retrofit buildings, where we add rooftop photovoltaics, nuclear, carbon capture, and adopting different types of district underground heating systems. The point is you can start to see how fast we could do something like this and what the real game-changers are.”

The class also designed and conducted a preliminary survey, to be expanded in the fall, that captures the MIT community's attitudes towards the different technologies. Preliminary results were shared with the Climate Nucleus during students’ May 9 presentations.

“I think it’s this unique and wonderful intersection of the forward-looking and innovative nature of academia with real world impact and specificity that you’d typically only find in industry,” Germonpre says. “It lets you work on a tangible project, the MIT campus, while exploring technologies that companies today find too risky to be the first mover on.”

From MIT’s campus to the world

The students recommended MIT form a building energy team to audit and retrofit all campus buildings. They also suggested MIT order a comprehensive geological feasibility survey to support planning regarding shallow and deep borehole fields for harvesting underground heat. A third recommendation was to communicate with the MIT community as well as with regulators and policymakers in the area about the deployment of nuclear batteries and deep geothermal boreholes on campus.

The students’ modeling tool can also help members of the working group explore various decarbonization pathways. For instance, installing rooftop photovoltaics now would effectively reduce emissions, but installing them in a few decades, when the regional electricity grid is expected to be reducing its reliance on fossil fuels anyways, would have a much smaller impact.

“When you have students working together, the recommendations are a little less filtered, which I think is a good thing,” Reinhart says. “I think there’s a real sense of urgency in the class. For certain choices, we have to basically act now.”

Reinhart plans to do more activities related to the Working Group and the class’ recommendations in the fall, and he says he’s currently engaged with the Massachusetts Governor's Office to explore doing something similar for the state.

Students say they plan to keep working on the survey this summer and continue studying their technology areas. In the longer term, they believe the experience will help them in their careers.

“Decarbonization is really important, and understanding how we can implement new technologies on campuses or in buildings provides me with a more well-rounded vision for what I could design in my career,” says Johnson Quamina, who wants to work as a structural or environmental engineer but says the class has also inspired her to consider careers in energy.

The students’ findings also have implications beyond MIT campus. In accordance with MIT’s 2015 climate plan that committed to using the campus community as a “test bed for change,” the students’ recommendations also hold value for organizations around the world.

“The mission is definitely broader than just MIT,” Germonpre says. “We don’t just want to solve MIT’s problem. We’ve dismissed technologies that were too specific to MIT. The goal is for MIT to lead by example and help certain technologies mature so that we can accelerate their impact.”

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This article is a collaborative effort by Alex Singla , Alexander Sukharevsky , Lareina Yee , and Michael Chui , with Bryce Hall , representing views from QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey, and McKinsey Digital.

Organizations are already seeing material benefits from gen AI use, reporting both cost decreases and revenue jumps in the business units deploying the technology. The survey also provides insights into the kinds of risks presented by gen AI—most notably, inaccuracy—as well as the emerging practices of top performers to mitigate those challenges and capture value.

AI adoption surges

Interest in generative AI has also brightened the spotlight on a broader set of AI capabilities. For the past six years, AI adoption by respondents’ organizations has hovered at about 50 percent. This year, the survey finds that adoption has jumped to 72 percent (Exhibit 1). And the interest is truly global in scope. Our 2023 survey found that AI adoption did not reach 66 percent in any region; however, this year more than two-thirds of respondents in nearly every region say their organizations are using AI. 1 Organizations based in Central and South America are the exception, with 58 percent of respondents working for organizations based in Central and South America reporting AI adoption. Looking by industry, the biggest increase in adoption can be found in professional services. 2 Includes respondents working for organizations focused on human resources, legal services, management consulting, market research, R&D, tax preparation, and training.

Also, responses suggest that companies are now using AI in more parts of the business. Half of respondents say their organizations have adopted AI in two or more business functions, up from less than a third of respondents in 2023 (Exhibit 2).

Gen AI adoption is most common in the functions where it can create the most value

Most respondents now report that their organizations—and they as individuals—are using gen AI. Sixty-five percent of respondents say their organizations are regularly using gen AI in at least one business function, up from one-third last year. The average organization using gen AI is doing so in two functions, most often in marketing and sales and in product and service development—two functions in which previous research  determined that gen AI adoption could generate the most value 3 “ The economic potential of generative AI: The next productivity frontier ,” McKinsey, June 14, 2023. —as well as in IT (Exhibit 3). The biggest increase from 2023 is found in marketing and sales, where reported adoption has more than doubled. Yet across functions, only two use cases, both within marketing and sales, are reported by 15 percent or more of respondents.

Gen AI also is weaving its way into respondents’ personal lives. Compared with 2023, respondents are much more likely to be using gen AI at work and even more likely to be using gen AI both at work and in their personal lives (Exhibit 4). The survey finds upticks in gen AI use across all regions, with the largest increases in Asia–Pacific and Greater China. Respondents at the highest seniority levels, meanwhile, show larger jumps in the use of gen Al tools for work and outside of work compared with their midlevel-management peers. Looking at specific industries, respondents working in energy and materials and in professional services report the largest increase in gen AI use.

Investments in gen AI and analytical AI are beginning to create value

The latest survey also shows how different industries are budgeting for gen AI. Responses suggest that, in many industries, organizations are about equally as likely to be investing more than 5 percent of their digital budgets in gen AI as they are in nongenerative, analytical-AI solutions (Exhibit 5). Yet in most industries, larger shares of respondents report that their organizations spend more than 20 percent on analytical AI than on gen AI. Looking ahead, most respondents—67 percent—expect their organizations to invest more in AI over the next three years.

Where are those investments paying off? For the first time, our latest survey explored the value created by gen AI use by business function. The function in which the largest share of respondents report seeing cost decreases is human resources. Respondents most commonly report meaningful revenue increases (of more than 5 percent) in supply chain and inventory management (Exhibit 6). For analytical AI, respondents most often report seeing cost benefits in service operations—in line with what we found last year —as well as meaningful revenue increases from AI use in marketing and sales.

Inaccuracy: The most recognized and experienced risk of gen AI use

As businesses begin to see the benefits of gen AI, they’re also recognizing the diverse risks associated with the technology. These can range from data management risks such as data privacy, bias, or intellectual property (IP) infringement to model management risks, which tend to focus on inaccurate output or lack of explainability. A third big risk category is security and incorrect use.

Respondents to the latest survey are more likely than they were last year to say their organizations consider inaccuracy and IP infringement to be relevant to their use of gen AI, and about half continue to view cybersecurity as a risk (Exhibit 7).

Conversely, respondents are less likely than they were last year to say their organizations consider workforce and labor displacement to be relevant risks and are not increasing efforts to mitigate them.

In fact, inaccuracy— which can affect use cases across the gen AI value chain , ranging from customer journeys and summarization to coding and creative content—is the only risk that respondents are significantly more likely than last year to say their organizations are actively working to mitigate.

Some organizations have already experienced negative consequences from the use of gen AI, with 44 percent of respondents saying their organizations have experienced at least one consequence (Exhibit 8). Respondents most often report inaccuracy as a risk that has affected their organizations, followed by cybersecurity and explainability.

Our previous research has found that there are several elements of governance that can help in scaling gen AI use responsibly, yet few respondents report having these risk-related practices in place. 4 “ Implementing generative AI with speed and safety ,” McKinsey Quarterly , March 13, 2024. For example, just 18 percent say their organizations have an enterprise-wide council or board with the authority to make decisions involving responsible AI governance, and only one-third say gen AI risk awareness and risk mitigation controls are required skill sets for technical talent.

Bringing gen AI capabilities to bear

The latest survey also sought to understand how, and how quickly, organizations are deploying these new gen AI tools. We have found three archetypes for implementing gen AI solutions : takers use off-the-shelf, publicly available solutions; shapers customize those tools with proprietary data and systems; and makers develop their own foundation models from scratch. 5 “ Technology’s generational moment with generative AI: A CIO and CTO guide ,” McKinsey, July 11, 2023. Across most industries, the survey results suggest that organizations are finding off-the-shelf offerings applicable to their business needs—though many are pursuing opportunities to customize models or even develop their own (Exhibit 9). About half of reported gen AI uses within respondents’ business functions are utilizing off-the-shelf, publicly available models or tools, with little or no customization. Respondents in energy and materials, technology, and media and telecommunications are more likely to report significant customization or tuning of publicly available models or developing their own proprietary models to address specific business needs.

Respondents most often report that their organizations required one to four months from the start of a project to put gen AI into production, though the time it takes varies by business function (Exhibit 10). It also depends upon the approach for acquiring those capabilities. Not surprisingly, reported uses of highly customized or proprietary models are 1.5 times more likely than off-the-shelf, publicly available models to take five months or more to implement.

Gen AI high performers are excelling despite facing challenges

Gen AI is a new technology, and organizations are still early in the journey of pursuing its opportunities and scaling it across functions. So it’s little surprise that only a small subset of respondents (46 out of 876) report that a meaningful share of their organizations’ EBIT can be attributed to their deployment of gen AI. Still, these gen AI leaders are worth examining closely. These, after all, are the early movers, who already attribute more than 10 percent of their organizations’ EBIT to their use of gen AI. Forty-two percent of these high performers say more than 20 percent of their EBIT is attributable to their use of nongenerative, analytical AI, and they span industries and regions—though most are at organizations with less than $1 billion in annual revenue. The AI-related practices at these organizations can offer guidance to those looking to create value from gen AI adoption at their own organizations.

To start, gen AI high performers are using gen AI in more business functions—an average of three functions, while others average two. They, like other organizations, are most likely to use gen AI in marketing and sales and product or service development, but they’re much more likely than others to use gen AI solutions in risk, legal, and compliance; in strategy and corporate finance; and in supply chain and inventory management. They’re more than three times as likely as others to be using gen AI in activities ranging from processing of accounting documents and risk assessment to R&D testing and pricing and promotions. While, overall, about half of reported gen AI applications within business functions are utilizing publicly available models or tools, gen AI high performers are less likely to use those off-the-shelf options than to either implement significantly customized versions of those tools or to develop their own proprietary foundation models.

What else are these high performers doing differently? For one thing, they are paying more attention to gen-AI-related risks. Perhaps because they are further along on their journeys, they are more likely than others to say their organizations have experienced every negative consequence from gen AI we asked about, from cybersecurity and personal privacy to explainability and IP infringement. Given that, they are more likely than others to report that their organizations consider those risks, as well as regulatory compliance, environmental impacts, and political stability, to be relevant to their gen AI use, and they say they take steps to mitigate more risks than others do.

Gen AI high performers are also much more likely to say their organizations follow a set of risk-related best practices (Exhibit 11). For example, they are nearly twice as likely as others to involve the legal function and embed risk reviews early on in the development of gen AI solutions—that is, to “ shift left .” They’re also much more likely than others to employ a wide range of other best practices, from strategy-related practices to those related to scaling.

In addition to experiencing the risks of gen AI adoption, high performers have encountered other challenges that can serve as warnings to others (Exhibit 12). Seventy percent say they have experienced difficulties with data, including defining processes for data governance, developing the ability to quickly integrate data into AI models, and an insufficient amount of training data, highlighting the essential role that data play in capturing value. High performers are also more likely than others to report experiencing challenges with their operating models, such as implementing agile ways of working and effective sprint performance management.

About the research

The online survey was in the field from February 22 to March 5, 2024, and garnered responses from 1,363 participants representing the full range of regions, industries, company sizes, functional specialties, and tenures. Of those respondents, 981 said their organizations had adopted AI in at least one business function, and 878 said their organizations were regularly using gen AI in at least one function. To adjust for differences in response rates, the data are weighted by the contribution of each respondent’s nation to global GDP.

Alex Singla and Alexander Sukharevsky  are global coleaders of QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey, and senior partners in McKinsey’s Chicago and London offices, respectively; Lareina Yee  is a senior partner in the Bay Area office, where Michael Chui , a McKinsey Global Institute partner, is a partner; and Bryce Hall  is an associate partner in the Washington, DC, office.

They wish to thank Kaitlin Noe, Larry Kanter, Mallika Jhamb, and Shinjini Srivastava for their contributions to this work.

This article was edited by Heather Hanselman, a senior editor in McKinsey’s Atlanta office.

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More than half of Americans are following election news closely, and many are already worn out

A majority of Americans say they are closely following news about the 2024 U.S. presidential election, a slightly higher share than in April 2020. At the same time, many people already say they are worn out by so much coverage of the campaign and candidates, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted this April.

To examine Americans’ habits and attitudes toward political and election news and information, Pew Research Center surveyed 8,709 U.S. adults from April 8 to 14, 2024.

Everyone who completed the survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), an online survey panel that is recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The surveys are weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other categories. Read more about the  ATP’s methodology .

Here are the  questions used for this analysis , along with responses, and its  methodology .

Pew Research Center is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts, its primary funder. This is the latest analysis in Pew Research Center’s ongoing investigation of the state of news, information and journalism in the digital age, a research program funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts, with generous support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

How closely Americans follow election news

More than half of Americans (58%) say they are following news about candidates for the 2024 presidential election very or fairly closely. Another 28% say they aren’t following it too closely, and 13% aren’t following it closely at all.

The share of Americans who are closely following election news is slightly higher now than it was in April 2020 (52%). In October 2020, however, that share increased to 75%.

This year, Republicans and independents who lean toward the Republican Party are slightly more likely than Democrats and Democratic leaners to say they are closely following election news (64% vs. 58%).

As in past presidential elections, older adults are more likely than younger adults to say they are closely following news about the candidates. Roughly eight-in-ten U.S. adults ages 65 and older (82%) currently say this, compared with 68% of those ages 50 to 64, 48% of those ages 30 to 49, and only 34% of those ages 18 to 29.

Fatigue over election coverage

Although many Americans are following news about the 2024 presidential candidates, they are also experiencing fatigue over election coverage. About six-in-ten U.S. adults (62%) already say they are worn out by so much coverage of the campaign and candidates, while 35% say they like seeing a lot of this coverage.

This is similar to the share of Americans who said they felt worn out at later points in the last two presidential election years. In June and July 2016 , 59% of Americans said they felt worn out, and in October 2020 , 61% felt this way.

Americans who are following election news closely are less likely than those who aren’t to be worn out by election coverage. Four-in-ten Americans who say they follow news about candidates very closely say they are worn out by so much coverage, compared with 77% of those who say they don’t follow it closely at all.

Republicans are slightly less likely than Democrats to say they are worn out by election coverage (58% vs. 66%). This gap is driven by conservative Republicans (55%), who are less likely than moderate or liberal Republicans (65%) to feel worn out.

How Americans come across election news

Americans are more likely to say they mostly get political news because they happen to come across it (57%) than because they are looking for it (42%).

However, there are striking differences on this question by age. Just a quarter of Americans ages 18 to 29 say they mostly get political news because they are looking for it, compared with 60% of those 65 and older – a gap of 35 percentage points.

Those who say they closely follow news about the 2024 presidential election are also far more likely to actively seek out political news. About six-in-ten U.S. adults who closely follow election news (58%) say they mostly get political news this way, compared with 18% of those who are not closely following election news.

Republicans and Democrats are equally likely to say they mostly get political news because they look for it (44% vs. 43%). However, independents who do not lean toward either party (21%) are about half as likely to say this.

Sources of election news

We also asked what type of sources Americans get most of their political and election news from. A majority of U.S. adults (62%) say they get most of this news from journalists and news organizations. (The question did not ask how people access that news , such as through TV, print, news websites or social media.)

Around one-in-ten Americans (11%) say they get most political and election news from friends, family and neighbors. Smaller shares say they get most of this news from celebrities and social media personalities (4%), politicians and political parties (3%), and ordinary people they don’t know (2%). An additional 17% say they don’t get most of their political or election news from any of these sources.

There are a few differences in election news sources by Americans’ age and political party:

• Older Americans are far more likely than younger ones to say they get most political and election news from journalists and news organizations. Around three-quarters of Americans ages 65 and older (78%) say this, compared with 68% of those ages 50 to 64, 55% of those 30 to 49, and 45% of those 18 to 29.
• Adults under 30 are significantly more likely than those 65 and older to say they get most of this news from celebrities and social media personalities (10% vs. 1%). They are also more likely to get this news from friends, family and neighbors (18% vs. 6%).
• Democrats are slightly more likely than Republicans to say they get most political and election news from journalists and news organizations (69% vs. 59%).
• Republicans are slightly more likely than Democrats to say they don’t get most political or election news from any of these sources (20% vs. 12%).

Note: Here are the questions used for this analysis , along with responses, and its methodology . Research Assistant Emily Tomasik contributed to this analysis.

• Election 2024
• Election News
• News Coverage
• Politics & Media

Kirsten Eddy is a senior researcher focusing on news and information at Pew Research Center .

Two-thirds of U.S. adults say they’ve seen their own news sources report facts meant to favor one side

A growing share of voters say it’s important to them to hear from the trump and biden campaigns, americans are following news about presidential candidates much less closely than covid-19 news, black and white democrats differ in their media diets, assessments of primaries, 5 key findings from our latest election news pathways survey, from impeachment to the democratic race, most popular.

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UMass Chan Medical School opens new $350 million research building in Worcester

UMass Chan Medical School in Worcester has opened a new research and education tower that administrators say will strengthen the school’s standing as a leader in developing cutting edge treatments.

The $350 million glass-paneled building will be a hub for neurology and gene therapy for illnesses like ALS and Alzheimer’s disease. Across nine floors, it includes labs and other facilities that will allow researchers to conduct clinical trials and other experiments.

“This building reflects the ambitions and capabilities of a university committed to discovery, learning and healing,” UMass Chan Chancellor Michael Collins said during an unveiling ceremony Friday. “We are inspired every day to remember that biomedical research brings hope to the human condition.”

The opening of the center continues the explosive growth of Massachusetts’ only public medical school, which founded in the 1960s.

In 2021, the school received a $175 million donation that more than doubled its endowment. Two years later, administrators said UMass Chan secured more than $320 million in federal and private research grants, making it one of the fastest growing research institutions in the country. And earlier this month, the school graduated its largest class in its history.

Administrators said UMass Chan was fortunate to finish construction of the new research building on time and on budget. The school launched the project in 2020 just as pandemic-linked supply chain challenges stalled other construction plans nationwide. If the school started the project today, Collins said inflation would have more than doubled the cost and derailed the plans.

In addition to serving as a research hub, officials noted the building — which relies on renewable energy for heat and air conditioning — will also help Worcester’s economy. The school met its workforce diversity goals during construction with nearly $50 million in contracting money going to companies owned by women or people of color.

Going forward, officials say the new center will add to Worcester’s identity as a burgeoning biotech and life sciences hotspot.

“We are driven by a hunger for innovation, a hunger for growth and a hunger to meet and exceed our friends to the east,” said state Sen. Robyn Kennedy, who represents the Worcester area.

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Meet the anti-abortion group using white coats and research to advance its cause

On a winter day less than two years after the fall of Roe v. Wade, Dr. Ingrid Skop beamed at a crowd of anti-abortion activists gathered at the Texas Capitol.

“The sun is shining on us. I think someone is happy with what we’re doing,” said Skop, a longtime OB-GYN, clad in a white doctor's coat.

Her smile dropped as she launched into a speech attacking the Food and Drug Administration’s regulation of mifepristone for medication abortions. “One out of 20 women ends up needing emergency surgery with these dangerous pills,” she said.

The statistic isn’t far off, but the procedure that Skop warned of is a vacuum aspiration to clear the uterus, considered routine in miscarriage care and low-risk .

Skop’s warnings about abortion extend far beyond this rally. She is the vice president and director of medical affairs of the Charlotte Lozier Institute, established in 2011 as the research arm of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, a nonprofit group that works to elect anti-abortion candidates. 

In a movement where many adherents are guided by religious or ideological beliefs, the institute has tried to win on secular grounds by offering research and studies aimed at countering the well-established scientific consensus that abortion care is safe.

Since Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, the institute has gained visibility and notoriety as it has worked to justify abortion bans the majority of Americans don’t support . Two studies led by its vice president, James Studnicki, were cited in a federal ruling challenging the approval of mifepristone. Skop is part of a group that brought the original suit. The Supreme Court is expected to rule on a narrower version of the case this month. 

But the institute has also taken heat. The two studies were later retracted — unfairly, the authors argued — by the journal that published them.

In May, Skop's appointment to the Texas maternal mortality review committee drew the ire of maternal health advocates and abortion rights supporters who see her positions as ideological and in conflict with the committee’s mission to improve maternal health.

The institute is often described as the anti-abortion movement’s answer to the Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy group that supports abortion rights. Skop and her peers have provided conservative officials with their own bench of experts.

“Abortion activists dominate the scientific community,” Skop told NBC News by email. “CLI research is one of the only voices to counter the biased, abortion-affirming research.”

Over the past decade, the institute’s studies, including ones assailing abortion medication and promoting crisis pregnancy centers that counsel women against abortion, have been cited by politicians and judges alike .

Mary Ziegler, a historian and expert on abortion law, said the group’s work may help give legislators “political cover.”

“The scientific arguments that CLI is making," she said, "are just one more arrow in the quiver of legislators who already think abortion is contrary to God’s law."

Named for one of the first female physicians in the U.S., the Charlotte Lozier Institute was launched in a different era for abortion rights. Roe v. Wade was still the law of the land, and Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America was working to elect candidates who would make it harder to access abortions.

The institute’s job, under the guidance of its founder and first president, Chuck Donovan, a veteran of the anti-abortion movement, was to provide data to help them. In a 2018 promotional video , a series of state lawmakers praised the group as a source of “facts” and “credibility.”

Kristi Hamrick, a spokesperson for Students for Life of America, said the institute plays a “very important role” by providing “an alternative scientific voice that looks at data” that groups like hers can use in their campaigns.

The institute’s influence extends to state legislatures, where its team testified in favor of bills that would prohibit most abortions after 20 weeks, and require that patients be told about a process called “abortion reversal,” a disputed treatment that abortion opponents claim can undo a medication abortion. 

Skop and others on the institute’s roster of staff and representatives are open about their religious beliefs . On a recent episode of a podcast affiliated with the American Family Association, a right-wing Christian activist group, she launched into a fierce critique of other abortion research.

“The abortion industry drives the narrative. They publish poor-quality studies. The mainstream media, of course, promotes abortion and picks it up,” she said. “So the American people have been gaslighted.”

In an interview, Rachel Jones, a principal research scientist with the Guttmacher Institute, said its work holds up under scrutiny. “We’ve been doing research for over 50 years on abortion, and we haven’t had any studies retracted,” Jones said, noting that the group is transparent about its data and its shortcomings. “Our track record speaks for itself.”

As patients with pregnancy complications in restrictive states like Texas go public with experiences of being denied treatment, the Charlotte Lozier Institute, like many anti-abortion groups, has argued that these have resulted from a misreading of the laws, rather than the bans themselves.

“Rather than blame pro-life laws when confused physicians have withheld emergency medical care, a result of abortion advocates’ fear mongering, state medical boards must provide guidance to clarify confusion, but many have not done so,” Skop said in a statement to NBC News.

But doctors have said the bans — which call for stripping medical licenses, and imposing fines or criminal charges on violators — create a chilling effect , and the institute itself cites guidance that discourages abortions as an emergency intervention.

When it’s necessary to perform what Skop calls a “separation of the mother and her unborn child” in the second trimester, she has cited the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists , of which she is a member, in arguing that doctors should perform cesarean sections or induce labor, rather than an abortion procedure commonly called dilation and evacuation (D&E). More OBGYNs have the skills to perform C-sections and induction, Skop has noted , and in some cases they could preserve a chance of saving the fetus’ life.

Dr. Ghazaleh Moayedi, an OB-GYN who practices in Texas, serves as the board chair for Physicians for Reproductive Health, which supports abortion rights. She sees recommendations like these as an attempt to limit doctors’ ability to provide necessary care. In many cases, she added, it’s clear that a fetus won’t survive, and to imply otherwise is misleading.

“They view it as more dignified in some way for the fetus,” she said of the institute’s stance that doctors should avoid D&E’s. “What’s left unsaid in that statement is that it’s at the expense of any dignity, humanity or care for pregnant people themselves.”

Skop pushed back on the assertion that some patients might prefer a D&E to induction in these cases, referring to it by a term commonly used by abortion opponents.

“When experiencing a tragic loss, I have never had a pregnant mother prefer a dismemberment abortion over induction because mothers want to hold and bury their babies, which assists in their grief,” she wrote.

In March, the institute named a new leader, Karen Czarnecki, who previously worked for the American Legislative Exchange Council and Heritage Foundation.

It continues to rely on private funding. In recent years, its donors have included the Alliance Defending Freedom, which brought the mifepristone case; The 85 Fund, a group tied to the conservative judicial activist Leonard Leo; and the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal order.

In a recent video appearance , Studnicki, highlighted the institute’s recent wins. “If you look at our record in the last three or four years, we’ve been very, very successful,” he said.

But it also suffered a major blow this February when the medical publisher Sage retracted three studies on which Studnicki was a lead author. In a blog post, Sage said it flagged problems including conflicts of interest, “misleading presentations of data,” and “fundamental problems with the study design and methodology.”

One of the studies, published in 2021, made an alarming claim: that hospital visits had skyrocketed between 2002 and 2015 among Medicaid patients who had medication abortions. 

Ushma Upadhyay, who researches medication abortion at the University of California, San Francisco, published a paper that reviewed the study. She said the institute conflated visits to the ER within 30 days of an abortion with “adverse events.” But patients may go to the ER just to get reassurance that the procedure has gone smoothly, Upadhyay said.

Her research has shown that more than half of these visits don’t result in treatment. Lozier's study, she said, didn’t address whether patients were admitted or received treatments, which would present a fuller picture of what, if any, complications occurred.

In response to that critique, Skop said ER visits, even without treatment, showed that patients “don’t know what to expect because they are not receiving adequate informed consent.”

She called the retractions “meritless,” contending that the group’s anti-abortion stance has led to “unprovoked and partisan attacks.”

The Supreme Court will soon rule on mifepristone. It opted not to hear arguments challenging the FDA’s initial approval of the drug, but will consider whether to restrict its availability. The changes proposed would require patients to visit a doctor in person to get the medication, as was the case before the Covid pandemic, and mandate that the pills only be used up to seven weeks in a pregnancy, rather than 10.

The retractions so far don’t seem to have damaged the institute’s standing in the anti-abortion movement. 

“These findings have been used in legal action in many of the states,” Studnicki recently said in a video response to the retractions. “We have become visible. People are quoting us. And for that reason, we are dangerous.”

Bracey Harris is a national reporter for NBC News, based in Jackson, Mississippi. 

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Rheumatoid arthritis articles from across Nature Portfolio

Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease that is characterized by inflammation of the joints and the subsequent destruction of cartilage and erosion of the bone. Patients with rheumatoid arthritis are treated with drugs that suppress the immune system.

Latest Research and Reviews

The chromatin landscape of pathogenic transcriptional cell states in rheumatoid arthritis

The epigenetic changes underlying the heterogeneity of RA disease presentation have been the subject of intense scrutiny. In this study, the authors use multiple single-cell sequencing datasets to define ‘chromatin superstates’ in patients with RA, which associate with distinct transcription factors and disease phenotypes.

• Kathryn Weinand
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Bispecific T cell engager therapy for refractory rheumatoid arthritis

In a case series of six patients with multidrug-resistant rheumatoid arthritis, the CD19xCD3-targeting bispecific T cell engager blinatumomab reduced disease activity and led to reductions in autoantibodies.

• Laura Bucci
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Joint-specific memory, resident memory T cells and the rolling window of opportunity in arthritis

This Review discusses joint-specific memory (the tendency of arthritis to recur in previously inflamed joints), explores the involvement of resident memory T cells and other contributors, and evaluates how arthritis might spread to new joints, emphasizing the important of sustained treatment.

• Margaret H. Chang
• Robert C. Fuhlbrigge
• Peter A. Nigrovic

Antigen-specific Fab profiling achieves molecular-resolution analysis of human autoantibody repertoires in rheumatoid arthritis

Although many autoimmune diseases are characterized by the presence of autoantibodies, complete characterisation of autoantibody repertoires is lacking. Here, the authors introduce an autoantigen-specific Fab profiling method to show that the autoantibody repertoire in rheumatoid arthritis is diverse yet dominated only by a few clones.

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The acute phase reactant orosomucoid-2 directly promotes rheumatoid inflammation

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Low-frequency and rare genetic variants associated with rheumatoid arthritis risk

Rheumatoid arthritis has a substantial genetic component, some of which is associated with the presence of low-frequency or rare variants. Next-generation sequencing in large and well-defined cohorts can continue to identify these variants and thereby contribute to the future prediction, diagnosis and treatment of rheumatoid arthritis.

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Advancing precision rheumatology through tissue and blood profiling

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All fibroblasts are equal, but some are more equal than others

Characteristic patterns of joint involvement exist in different forms of arthritis. Research now indicates that epigenetic programming of synovial fibroblasts diversifies their response to inflammatory cascades, leading to this anatomical variation in arthritis and its response to treatment.

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Re-establishing tolerance to autoantigens is an important aim for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Immunization of HLA-DR4 transgenic mice with citrullinated self-antigens can induce immune tolerance, which suggests that such antigens could have a therapeutic role in anti-citrullinated peptide antibody-positive RA.

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NIH Releases H5N1 Influenza Research Agenda

Understanding virus biology, advancing detection, treatment and prevention strategies are key objectives.

June 5, 2024

Three influenza A (H5N1/bird flu) virus particles (rod-shaped). Note: Layout incorporates two CDC transmission electron micrographs that have been inverted, repositioned, and colorized by NIAID. Scale has been modified.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, has released its plan for advancing H5N1 influenza basic research and translating those findings into strategies and interventions that can benefit people. The research agenda focuses on four key objectives: increasing understanding of the biology of H5N1 viruses and the factors that influence their ability to transmit and cause disease; developing and evaluating prevention strategies, such as vaccines; advancing existing and novel treatments, including antivirals and monoclonal antibodies; and supporting strategies for detecting H5N1 virus. The NIAID Research Agenda for 2024 H5N1 Influenza – May 2024 aligns with the NIAID role in the federal public health response to the U.S. outbreak of H5N1 influenza in people, dairy cows and other animals.

Since 2003, H5N1 influenza viruses have circulated in 23 countries, primarily affecting wild birds and poultry resulting in nearly 900 reported human cases, primarily among people who have had close contact with infected birds. In the past few years, however, a highly pathogenic avian influenza virus called HPAI H5N1 has spread to infect more than 50 animal species. In late March 2024, an HPAI H5N1 outbreak was reported among dairy cows in Texas. Although the virus so far has not shown genetic evidence of acquiring the ability to spread from person-to-person, public health officials are closely monitoring the outbreak as part of overarching pandemic preparedness efforts. 

The NIAID H5N1 research agenda builds on the Institute’s longstanding influenza research efforts. It addresses the current outbreak in U.S. dairy cows including potential human-to-human transmission of H5N1 influenza viruses. NIAID will leverage both its domestic and international research infrastructures to achieve the plan’s objectives.

WHAT:   NIAID Research Agenda for 2024 H5N1 Influenza – May 2024    

WHO:   NIAID Director Jeanne Marrazzo, M.D., M.P.H., is available to discuss the research agenda.

Submit a Media Request

Contact the NIAID News & Science Writing Branch.

301-402-1663 [email protected] All Media Contacts

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The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington, DC 20500

White   House Shares Government, Private Sector, Academic, and Non-Profit Actions to Accelerate Progress on Mental Health   Research

The United States is facing an unprecedented mental health crisis impacting Americans of all ages. To tackle this crisis, the Biden-Harris Administration has taken bold steps to transform how mental health is understood, accessed, and treated. Under President Biden’s Unity Agenda, the Biden-Harris Administration released a comprehensive mental health strategy and mental health research priorities . These steps aim to make mental health care more affordable and accessible and improve health outcomes for all Americans.  

As a part of Mental Health Awareness Month, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy called on government agencies, the private sector, nonprofit organizations, and academia to share the actions they are taking to expand and improve mental health research in the United States. These actions address key research priorities and move us closer to a future where every American has access to the best available care when and where they need it.

Government Actions

• The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Common Fund’s Community Partnerships to Advance Science for Society (ComPASS) Program announced 25 community-led research awards. The ComPASS program provides an unprecedented opportunity for communities to lead innovative intervention projects that study ways to address the underlying structural factors that affect health and health equity. Awards include research focused on addressing stigmatization of behavioral health and services and improving access to behavioral health services in Hispanic, low-income, rural, and LGBTQ+ communities.
• Accelerating Medicines Partnership® Program for Schizophrenia (AMP SCZ) released its first research data set — AMP SCZ 1.0 —through a collaboration of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), the Foundation for NIH, the Food and Drug Administration, and multiple public and private partners. To improve the understanding of schizophrenia and to identify new and better targets for treatment, AMP SCZ established a research network that examines trajectories for people who are at clinical high risk for psychosis. The network also develops psychosis prediction algorithms using biomarkers, clinical data, and existing clinical high risk-related datasets.
• NIMH’s Individually Measured Phenotypes to Advance Computational Translation in Mental Health program is a new initiative focused on using behavioral measures and computational methods to define novel clinical signatures that can be used for individual-level prediction and clinical decision making in treating mental disorders . As one example of research supported through this initiative, researchers at the University of Washington are applying computational modeling strategies to behavioral data collected through a smartphone app, with the goal of predicting and preventing serious negative outcomes for people who experience hallucinations.
• NIMH awarded research grants to develop and test innovative psychosocial interventions to prevent suicide. Researchers at San Diego State, one of the grant recipients, are combining an existing intervention—the Safety Planning Intervention—with patient navigator services, and testing the effectiveness of this novel combined intervention in reducing suicide risk among sexual and gender minority youth and young adults.
• NIMH and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development funded 11 new studies focused on understanding bidirectional relationships between social media use and adolescent mental illness, psychiatric symptoms, and risk or resilience for psychopathology . Collectively, this research aims to address important questions about the short-term and long-term interactions between social media behavior and youth mental health, as well as the mechanisms contributing to risk and resilience.

Private Sector, Academic, and Non-Profit Actions

• The University of California, Somos Esenciales, and Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital are conducting the Supporting Peer Interactions to Expand Access study, which examines digital mental health solutions in resource-limited settings, emphasizing cultural and linguistic inclusivity. This study examines a cognitive-behavioral therapy intervention for depression or anxiety for Latino patients with limited-English proficiency and tests implementation strategies, including support from community peers, to integrate this intervention into primary care.
• Headspace is launching a participatory research approach to better understand mental health needs. Headspace is partnering with the city of Hartford, Connecticut to provide mental health resources to all Hartford residents including free access to the Headspace app. This public-private partnership is the first of its kind to improve community-wide mental wellness while researching engagement with the Headspace app and the associated mental health outcomes.
• The Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) established a Mental and Behavioral Health Awards Program to champion integrated behavioral health (IBH) patient care models. The inaugural funding was awarded to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Georgetown University Medical Center, Texas A&M School of Medicine, and the University of California Davis School of Medicine for their innovative approaches to IBH team training and patient care, as well as their commitment to accessible and equitable whole person care. AAMC will summarize and disseminate lessons learned from these institutions to advance IBH across the health care delivery system.
• Unity Health Care established the $2.3 million J. Willard and Alice S. Marriott Foundation’s Behavioral Health Development Fund to train the next generation of IBH fellows. This program allows Unity to recruit and train the next generation of mental health providers, with a focus on models of care that expand access, improve outcomes, and drive health equity through IBH. The behavioral health providers work seamlessly with primary care providers to address unmet critical and looming mental health challenges with a culturally congruent approach.
• The American Association of Psychiatric Pharmacists is providing up to $500,000 to study the impact of integrating Board-Certified Psychiatric Pharmacists (BCPPs) into health care teams. BCPPs are advanced practice clinical pharmacists who provide Comprehensive Medication Management within team-based care focusing on medication optimization, evidence-based practices, and patient-centered goals. These research grants fund multiple sites and expand the number and quality of studies involving BCPPs.
• The Healthy Brains Global Initiative (HBGI), the Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission, and initially three counties in California, are implementing performance-based pilot programs to improve outcomes for people living with serious mental illnesses. These pilots are testing reimbursement for achieving health, housing, and wellbeing outcomes while strengthening the performance management of existing Full Service Partnership (FSP) services. FSP programs intend to be comprehensive services for individuals who are unhoused and who are experiencing severe mental illness.
• The NIH-funded RAND-USC Schaeffer Opioid Policy Tools and Information Center (OPTIC) is building evidence to guide policy responses to the opioid crisis. RAND and the University of Southern California lead OPTIC, a collaboration of eight research institutions, to create national resources to guide policy responses to the opioid crisis. OPTIC develops and disseminates information on policy effectiveness overall and in diverse, structurally disadvantaged communities, improved tools and methods for assessing policy effects, and strategies for addressing the opioid crisis.
• Insight is opening a new medical-psychiatric hospital to serve the community disproportionately burdened by the Flint Water Crisis with a $2.5 million grant from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. The hospital and services are being designed to transform how behavioral health is understood, accessed, treated, and integrated with medical and community services. Research at the hospital will focus on advancing equity in access to behavioral health services, developing treatments for serious illnesses, and supporting youth mental health.
• RAND and Active Minds are evaluating how Send Silence Packing®, the country’s largest traveling campus-based mental health literacy and suicide prevention exhibit, affects college students’ knowledge, behaviors, and stigma around mental health. Findings will guide scalability, resource allocation and decision-making on college campuses and efforts to optimize peer-informed actions to support student mental health and well-being.
• The Child Mind Institute (CMI) is leveraging over $150M from partnerships with the Stavros Niarchos Foundation and the State of California to expand mental health care access for youth in marginalized communities worldwide. CMI utilizes evidence-based, culturally adapted educational resources, provider training, and scalable, innovative, open-source digital technologies for mental health assessment and intervention. The Youth Mental Health Academy recruits a diverse workforce by providing educational and internship experiences to 2,500 high school students from under-represented communities. The Healthy Brain Network openly shares diverse brain and behavior data from >7,000 participants for pediatric mental health and learning research.

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