George Church discusses the biotechnology underpinning GRO Biosciences Inc., which could provide a workaround for some well-known problems in protein therapeutics. The startup just hauled in millions to tackle those problems.
Beyond Meat (BYND) was one of last year’s hottest stocks. Shares of the plant-based meat company exploded 859% during its first three months out of the gate.
In the early 2000s, Jay Shendure was a graduate student in George Church’s lab at Harvard University. Back then, he says, there was “hardly an inkling” that the lab would become a hotbed of startup activity.
“DNA is like a computer program but far, far more advanced than any software ever created.”
Bill Gates wrote this in 1995, long before synthetic biology – a scientific discipline focused on reading, writing, and editing DNA – was being harnessed to program living cells.
By altering the genetic code in bacteria, researchers have demonstrated a method to make therapeutic proteins more stable, an advance that would improve the drugs’ effectiveness and convenience.