By Jason Bates May 12, 2021 Though other pandemics have affected the U.S. over the past 100 years, COVID-19 has been compared most often to the 1918 influenza pandemic in terms of its impact. Both events overwhelmed the health care system and drastically altered everyday life across the country. Decades of NSF research led to innovations such as polymerase chain reaction-based DNA analysis and the bacterial enzyme CRISPR. Building on this work, scientists and engineers were able to quickly respond to the country’s immediate needs -- discovering how the virus works and identifying methods to track its spread. Their contributions also laid the foundation for the rapid development of treatments and vaccines to protect people from the virus.