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The editorial staff of BBC News World
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2022 was a year of incredible breakthroughs in science, medicine and space exploration that set the stage for further advances in 2023.
From NASA’s Artemis program, which took us back to lunar exploration, to new methods of rapid and effective vaccine development.
The year 2023 also promises to build on these advances.
Here are five breakthroughs to look forward to.
1. The next generation of vaccines
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Thanks to the success of mRNA vaccines against the Covid-19 pandemic, all types of vaccines are being developed with this technology against a whole range of diseases.
Vaccines in development include malaria, tuberculosis, genital herpes, HIV, cystic fibrosis, cancer and various types of lung diseases, among others.
German drugmaker BioNTech plans to begin human trials of its mRNA vaccine against malaria and tuberculosis in a few weeks, while US company Moderna will test its vaccine against the viruses that cause genital herpes and shingles.
One of the most promising mRNA vaccines is that against cancer. They are designed to recognize and destroy cancer cells.
Other pharmaceutical companies are exploring the possibility of quickly and efficiently administering the Covid vaccine via a simple nasal spray. They have been working on animals and human trials are expected soon.
2. Advanced space observation
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The Vera C. Camera The Ruby Telescope Camera has a capacity 1,000 times greater than a conventional camera.
The world is stunned by new images of the Universe captured by the mighty James Webb Space Telescope, the instrument launched by NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency that will continue to provide discoveries for decades to come.
But there will be deeper exploration tools.
ESA plans to launch the Euclid telescope in 2023, which will orbit the Sun for six years to create a 3D map of the Universe. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency is developing a mission to detect X-rays emitted by distant stars and galaxies.
And in Chile, the Vera C. Rubin telescope, whose camera has a detection power of more than 3 billion pixels, is ready to take pictures next July. The telescope has the capacity to image the entire southern sky in just three days.
3. Missions to the moon
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NASA’s Lunar Flashlight program will literally illuminate craters and hidden corners of the moon to analyze the composition of ice deposits.
NASA’s Artemis program, which sent the Orion capsule to the moon without anyone aboard and successfully returned it to Earth last December, is just the beginning of more visits from our satellite.
The United Arab Emirates launched their lunar rover Rashid on December 11 to explore the lunar surface. On that day, NASA also sent into orbit a satellite designed to study the composition of frozen water deposits in craters and permanently obscured regions on the moon.
There’s also Japan’s HAKUTO-R module, which will attempt a smooth lunar landing in April, and India’s Chandrayaan-3 module, which is scheduled to land near the moon’s south pole in mid-2023.
One of the most anticipated missions will be the first civilian flight to the moon. Eleven people will embark on a six-day trip aboard Elon Musk’s SpaceX company’s Starship rocket.
4. CRISPR genetic engineering
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2023 could be the year that CRISPR-Cas9 therapy, a gene-editing technique that alters a strand of DNA by cutting off part of it and reassembling it into a new sequence, is licensed.
The treatment has shown promising results in clinical trials against two genetic blood disorders, including sickle cell anemia.
Vertex Pharmaceuticals and CRISPR Therapeutics are developing the treatment, called Exa-Cel, which will be submitted for US Food and Drug Administration approval in March.
This release will make exa-cel available to patients with sickle cell disease, a serious structural deformity of red blood cells that impedes blood flow.
5. Drugs for Alzheimer’s disease
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Alzheimer’s research will enter a drug development phase.
In November this year, the development of a drug that can slow down the destruction of the brain in Alzheimer’s disease was announced and hailed as a breakthrough.
In early January 2023, the US regulator will announce whether it can be made available to treat patients, although the drug is only effective in the early stages of the disease.
It’s the drug lecanemab that targets the sticky plaque — called beta-amyloid — that builds up in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s disease.
In a research field plagued by failures, this drug is considered by experts to be “the beginning of therapies against Alzheimer’s disease”.
Another drug called Blarcamesine, which activates a protein that improves the stability of neurons, will continue clinical trials. It is developed by pharmaceutical company Anavex Life Sciences.