(bottles clinking) It's been nearly four years since a pivotal moment in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

- For the first time today, Americans are getting a COVID-19 vaccine.

- [Michelle] Vaccines made from ribonucleic acid, also known as RNA, have been credited with saving countless lives.

- So anybody knows what DNA is, and RNA was sort of like the distant cousin that nobody wanted to talk about.

- [Michelle] Brown University Professor Juan Alfonzo says the pandemic got more people talking about RNA, molecules that take genetic information found in DNA and turn it into processes like making proteins.

Take the current COVID-19 vaccines, for example.

It was RNA that taught cells how to quickly trigger an immune response to the coronavirus.

Alfonzo says the vaccines just scratch the surface of what's possible with RNA.

- We're all thinking, "Okay, if that one RNA did it, "what about the other millions of RNA molecules "that we can even manipulate in a lab "and make them do something new, right?"

- That's just the tip of the iceberg.

- Tip of the iceberg, yeah.

- [Michelle] Alfonzo is the executive director of Brown University's RNA Center in Providence.

He wants Brown University and Rhode Island as a whole to become a major hub for RNA research nationwide, and he says there's a lot of interest from students who want to pursue this field.

- It's like computer science in the 1980s, remember?

Everybody wanted to be a computer scientist, and with RNA right now, it's like that.

It's like everyone, "Oh, RNA, I'm interested."

- Much remains unknown about these molecules.

Alfonzo says scientists don't know the function of most RNA, and adding to the mystery, there are more than 180 known RNA modifications.

Would you say this is really because of a shortcoming in technology that we don't know the function of most of the RNA that exists?

- Partly, yes.

It's not just technology.

I mean, technology guides discovery, but ideas drive technology.

- [Michelle] Alfonzo is part of a nationwide network of researchers with an ambitious idea known as the Human RNome Project to sequence all of the RNA in human cells and map all the modifications.

It's the RNA equivalent of the Human Genome Project, which sequenced human DNA.

- Think of RNA as the future in better healthcare, cheaper healthcare.

- [Michelle] Dr. Vivian Cheung, a professor at the University of Michigan, has been studying RNA for decades.

She's joining the faculty at Brown University in the fall.

She's eager to learn the order of the building blocks that make up all RNA molecules.

Cheung says current technology to sequence RNA does not go far enough.

She likens it to reading a book where many of the letters are missing.

- That's exactly how we're reading RNA today.

We're missing many of the modifications, or missing most of the letters.

So we don't know.

We cannot read it completely, and it's very hard to copy it to make medicine.

We need to be able to make and sequence RNA quickly, cheaply.

- [Michelle] Cheung and other researchers briefed congressional staff earlier this year on the potential uses of RNA, including as medicine for many diseases currently without treatments.

But they say they need the federal government's help to make it happen.

- It's not so astronomical that it's not within reach, but we really need leadership, and kind of national infrastructure to make this possible.

- [Michelle] Researchers say RNA vaccines are being developed for malaria, tuberculosis, various cancers, and allergies.

RNA is already being used as a defense against plant pathogens and to help crops increase their yields.

- It seems that we should and must be able to read the RNA that is in every single one of our cells, and we have already seen the future of what it can be.

- [Michelle] Rhode Island US Senator Jack Reed is pushing for the United States to take the lead on RNA research.

- As a nation, it is essential we maintain our global leadership to harness this tool for good.

- [Michelle] He says with every breakthrough, there's the potential for misuse.

Scientists say that could include creating viruses that harm our food supply, and even humans.

- There's a first-person advantage, because once you have the technology, and you can use it for good, we hope, but also for ill. We've seen this throughout history.

You know, we were able to develop nuclear weapons before everyone else.

I think if another country had gotten it first, it would not have ended up the way it did.

(light mysterious music) - A report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine published earlier this year offers a roadmap to sequence RNA.

They're calling on federal entities to get involved to advance the research, the technology.

Where do things stand right now with Congress?

- Congress has not yet, I think, carved out a specific role and designated a specific agency.

I must say one of the things that we've been really spending a lot of time in is artificial intelligence.

I think RNA is waiting to be elevated to this level.

- [Michelle] Rhode Island is working to bring that research to the forefront.

The state is growing its life science industry, which includes RNA.

- Many years ago, earlier in my career, we had two primary industries in Rhode Island, jewelry and textiles.

And for a variety of reasons, they left, and we haven't really replaced those.

- [Michelle] Neil Steinberg wants to change that.

He's the chair of the Rhode Island Life Science Hub, a quasi-state agency tasked with strengthening the sector.

That includes building new lab space in Providence.

- We have no commercial lab space here.

The universities have it.

The hospitals have it.

So if you and I started a company today, and we needed lab space, it does not exist in Rhode Island.

We'd have to go to Cambridge.

- [Michelle] Philanthropic organizations, like the Warren Alpert Foundation, are also throwing their support behind RNA initiatives.

Gus Schiesser is the organization's executive director.

- The foundation likes to take big swings at high reward projects, like this study, that have the potential for countless medical breakthroughs.

- [Michelle] In 2022, the foundation awarded the National Academy of Sciences $1 million to develop a roadmap to sequence all of the RNA in human cells.

- We're hoping that the RNome Project is like the Genome Project, you know, and the sequencing of RNA, you know is gonna lead to so many cures and treatments of diseases.

- Researchers say the pandemic sparked a renewed interest in science and they want to seize on that momentum.

When I think about US leaders galvanizing the American people around science, right, I think about JFK, and, you know, getting people energized to get a man on the Moon.

- We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.

- You're talking about something on that same scale.

- Yes, yes.

- [Michelle] Cheung says RNA technology can improve the world if leaders can get future scientists excited about the work.

- In order for RNA to become the bio-future for agriculture, for health, for data storage, or biodefense, we need people to work in these different sectors.

- [Michelle] Senator Jack Reed says the United States does not need to go at this alone.

He supports working with countries that are already funding RNA research, including Canada, Germany, and Australia.

- We can collaborate closely with them, and we can coordinate with them, and they are, you know, trusted allies in so many different ways.

- [Michelle] At Brown University, Professor Juan Alfonzo says it's important to seize on the momentum brought on by the pandemic.

- It is a moment in time with the RNA where not only the scientists are engaged, but the public is engaged, and that is unique, I think.