On Monday the news broke that Pfizer's experimental COVID-19 vaccine was more than 90 percent effective and could protect people around the world from the virus which has already killed over one million people.
The "dream team" couple behind the BNT162b2 vaccine are Uğur Şahin and Özlem Türeci, from Pfizer's partner company BioNTech SE.
Both scientists are the children of Turkish migrants who moved to Germany in the late 1960s, the Guardian reported.
Şahin, 55, BioNTech's chief executive, was born in İskenderun before moving with his family to Germany when he was a four-year-old.
The company's chief medical officer, 53-year-old Türeci, grew up in Lastrup, Germany, where her father worked as a surgeon.
The couple met at Saarland University in Homburg, Germany and were later married in 2002.
The Mirror reports the couple were so dedicated to their medical research that they spent some of their wedding day in the lab.
Since 2001, Şahin and Türeci have been based in Mainz, and set up their first company called Ganymed - after the Turkish expression roughly meaning "earned through hard work" - which pioneered precision antibody therapies against cancer.
The company was later sold to Japanese pharma company Astellas for NZ$2.7 billion in 2016, the Guardian reported.
In 2008, they set up BioNTech along with Austrian oncologist Christoph Huber which has grown to employ 1300 people and aims to develop immunotherapy cancer treatments.
After first reading about COVID-19 on January 24, Şahin said he gathered his employees to pivot the company to focus on a coronavirus vaccine.
Pfizer agreed to partner with their company to help with development and distribution costs after previously working together on a flu vaccine.
Their breakthrough with the vaccine was announced this week, projecting them into the global spotlight as countries lined up to secure doses.
The UK government has so far secured 40 million doses, and 10 million are expected to be available from the end of 2020 according to the Mirror.
In October New Zealand secured a deal to buy 1.5 million doses- enough for 750,000 people - on the condition the vaccine passed its phase three trials and got regulatory approval.
Minister of Research, Science and Innovation Megan Woods told The AM Show it was "good news" the vaccine appears to work even better than its creators expected.
"Obviously we are continuing talks, that if there is more stock available that we'd like to purchase more," she said.
When asked whether he would take the vaccine himself, Şahin told German news website Business Insider: "As soon as the vaccine has been permitted, I will be one of the first to do it".
"But first we have to make sure that the vaccine arrives with those people who need it urgently: especially the elderly, people with pre-existing conditions and medical staff."
Despite their wealth, colleagues say Şahin is a calm and measured man who reads scientific journals and enters business meetings wearing jeans and carrying his signature bicycle helmet and backpack with him.
"Despite his achievements, he never changed from being incredibly humble and personable," Matthias Kromayer, a board member of venture capital firm MIG AG, whose funds have backed BioNTech, told the Mirror.
