Professor Sarah Gilbert and Dr Catherine Green's account of making the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine continues. Today, in Cath's lab work begins on making the starting material destined to seed three billion doses. Tense weeks and months lie ahead. Debra Baker reads.

From the outset it was a race against the deadly virus that has caused - and continues to cause - devastation across the planet. Professor Sarah Gilbert and Dr Catherine Green explain the cutting-edge science, and sheer hard work that went into the extraordinary achievement of making an effective vaccine against Covid-19, and at the same time giving us hope that an end to this pandemic is in sight. All the while, throughout 2020, like everybody else they were adjusting to living and working through lockdowns and restrictions.

Sarah Gilbert is Professor of Vaccinology at the Jenner Institute at the University of Oxford, and her career has been dedicated to developing vaccines against disease. Since 2020, she has led the Oxford vaccine project. Catherine Green is Associate Professor in Chromosome Dynamics at the Wellcome Centre for Human Genetics, a Senior Research Fellow at Exeter College, and Head of Oxford University’s Clinical BioManufacturing Facility.

Abridged by Katrin Williams
Produced by Elizabeth Allard Show less