Modeling with Pfizer

Over this past year, we designed and printed custom models of Nirmatrelvir for Pfizer Inc. This anti-viral drug makes up Paxlovid and prevents the SARS CoV2 virus from digesting the polyprotein it uses to produce more viruses. We also developed an augmented reality (AR) component for the model, see Nirmatrelivr in action here!

Congratulations Tracy!

Congratulations to Tracy Swedlund for winning the 2023-24 National PLTW Engineering Teacher of the Year Award! The PLTW Teachers of the Year Awards recognizes the unparalleled commitment of educators to help students across all grades to be STEM-successful. We are honored for the opportunities to work with closley with Tracy throughout his career. He has worked with 3D Molecular Designs for years and has been a 3DMD Model Teacher^© since the program's inception in 2021. Congratulations Tracy, so well deserved! 

"Tracy creates an inclusive classroom environment, so all students feel a sense of belonging. Tracy is an extraordinary PLTW and science teacher, but even more than that, he is an extraordinary teacher and leader in our school, community, and state who puts his students first." 

- Laura Lundy, Director of Curriculum and Instruction, Medford School District.

Science Spotlight

Congratulations to Katalin Kariko, PhD, and Drew Weissman, MD, PhD, for winning the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine! They have both been working since the late 1990s to investigate the potential therapeutic properties of mRNA. In 2005, they published a paper on how mRNA can be altered to activate the immune system. Both Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna utilized Karikó and Weissman’s research to develop mRNA vaccines against SARS-CoV-2. The speed at which these vaccines were made and deployed is due to the research of Kariko and Weissman, which helped and continues to save many lives.

Tim Herman, PhD, has celebrated the research and accomplishments of Katalin Kariko for years! Check out this Tim Talk from an April 2021 webinar where he discusses how vital her research was to developing the mRNA vaccines.

Students Designing an mRNA Vaccine

Inspire students to design their own mRNA vaccine with our Engineering Biology activity. Students are challenged to apply what they know about DNA, RNA, and Proteins to design an mRNA vaccine that activates immune systems to protect from virus infection. Using RNA nucleotides and The Genetic Codon Circle^©, students will examine and compare codons preferences of the SARS CoV-2 mRNA with the engineered sequence of the mRNA vaccine to explore Codon Optimization.