A preliminary report published yesterday in the New England Journal of Medicine on an ongoing phase 1 clinical trial of the mRNA-1273 COVID-19 vaccine developed by Moderna and study sponsor the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) showed that it generated an immune response in healthy adults and was generally well tolerated.The vaccine was designed to cause the body to produce neutralizing antibodies against the novel coronavirus's spike protein, which the virus uses to bind to and enter human cells.The early report on the trial, led by researchers at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, involved the first 45 participants 18 to 55 years old enrolled at sites in Seattle and Emory University in