Bright side of the moonshots

THE FIRST virus to have its genome read was an obscure little creature called MS2; the 3,569 RNA letters it contained were published in 1976, the hard-won product of some ten years’ work in a well-staffed Belgian laboratory. The SARS-CoV-2 genome, almost nine times longer, was published just weeks after doctors in Wuhan first became concerned about a new pneumonia. That feat has since been repeated with getting on for 1m different samples of SARS-CoV-2 in the hunt for fearsome variants like the one ravaging Brazil. Within weeks of its publication, the original genome sequence became the basis for the vaccines that today are stymieing the virus wherever supplies, politics and public confidence allow.