mRNA vaccines seemed to appear out of nowhere in 2020, but they build on work begun in the 1990s. The main obstacle, a strong inflammatory reaction to injected RNA, was overcome in 2005 by Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman, who slightly modified its building blocks. The mRNA does not enter the cell nucleus and breaks down within days. The two researchers received the 2023 Nobel Prize in Medicine.
In 1843, inventor Alexander Bain patented a way to send images over telegraph wires using synchronized pendulums. By the 1860s, a commercial fax service was already linking cities. The telephone wasn't patented until 1876, more than three decades after that first fax patent. The fax is really a child of the telegraph age.
On 8 October 1958, in Stockholm, 43-year-old Arne Larsson received the very first implanted pacemaker. The device, designed by engineer Rune Elmqvist and implanted by surgeon Åke Senning, worked for only a few hours and had to be replaced. Larsson went on to receive more than twenty pacemakers in his lifetime. He died in 2001 aged 86, outliving both the engineer and the surgeon.