a lot of people tell me I live in the
future
I like that it’s kind of fun I never
look backwards but the future is coming
at us faster and faster and I want to
walk you into my world now
I’m a little hard to define I’m part
scientist part businessman part mm-hmm
really a tinkerer I’ve pulled everything
apart that I’ve ever owned see how it
works with the exception of the cat
I usually describe myself as a cell
biologist and I want to introduce you to
my little friends because we’re all used
to our cell phones but these cells which
are the really the foundation of every
living thing on this planet are really
unknown to most people and that’s
because they’re microscopic we didn’t
even know they existed until about 400
years ago and as you can see they’re
doing a lot of stuff there’s a lot of
things going on in these cells they’re
manufacturing proteins and lipids and
organizing copying DNA and separating
the chromosomes as the cells divide
these are the most powerful little
factories on the planet these can make
thousands of different compounds these
have been around for four billion years
in an unbroken chain of life that
continues to branch out and create new
forms cell biology is absolutely
beautiful and it’s addicting if you
start looking under a microscope at
these little organisms whether they be
bacterial single cells or eukaryotic
cells like the cells that make us cells
are so complex cells are so mysterious
remember we’ve only known about them for
four hundred years and we haven’t had
great tools to look at them
we still ascribe their creation to
deities we still look at we we we say to
scientists if they try and monkey with
this cell that they are playing God it’s
remarkable
and yet these cells are everywhere we
have 50 trillion cells in our own body
and scientists tell us we may have 10
times more bacterial cells in and on us
cells are everywhere now we’ve been D
convoluting the wiring of cells for as
long as we’ve known about them
we’ve started to map the biochemistry
and it’s all tangled it’s like it’s like
trying to untangle the ingredients in a
bubbling pot of soup but we’re getting
pretty good at it because we’re learning
how to share information and record it
in computers this is that wiring D
convoluted this is really the wiring
diagram of a eukaryotic cell this is
from a from a database it’s the overview
the high-level overview and it’s really
the sum total of thousands of scientists
working decades putting all this
together now you can drill into this
database here I’m just going into one
particular sugar pathway that generates
different molecules and you can start to
see every compound every chemical that’s
made and every enzyme catalyzing every
reaction this is a remarkable data asset
and it’s available to everyone and this
is really again it’s like looking at a
complex wiring diagram of an of a
computer chip or a car but more than
that we can actually go down into the
code the genetic code that makes all of
these reactions all this biochemistry
all this magic and that’s because of
this project that was started conceived
in the 1980s a long time ago started a
formally in 1990 first draft completed
in 2000 and all the t’s crossed and and
essentially the project wrapped up in
2003 that’s a long time ago 14 years
since this wrapped up but it hasn’t
really stopped it just keeps it was just
really the starting point for what we
know with genomics the human genome
project was successful because of the
promise of sequencing the human genome
the scientists said look it’s going to
be expensive we figure it’ll cost about
three billion dollars we figure it’ll
take 15 years but if we can read the
of a human being we’ll know more about
cancer we’ll know more about health
we’ll we’ll just what what could be more
powerful than understanding the program
that makes people most of us has never
looked at this data now we end up with
technology that is accelerating to
generate this type of data the first
genome was 3 billion dollars the second
one was about a hundred million dollars
and I just had my genome sequenced a few
months ago for under a thousand dollars
there’s there’s been very few
technologies this may be the only
technology that has ever decreased in
price and increased in performance so
fast that most of us don’t use know
about or care about this is remarkable
but things are shifting we’re not just
reading genomes anymore which today is
informing things like our cancer
treatments telling us what microbes are
in the environment allowing us to really
understand their food crops etc now we
have been have got tools to actually
start writing genomes and I don’t mean
modifying genomes modifying genomes the
way it used to be done remember we’ve
been doing genetic engineering since the
1970s modifying genomes is really just
flipping a couple of bits here and
they’re reorganizing a few things adding
in one new trait or ability maybe a few
I’m talking we actually have tools now
that allow us to take electronic data
electronic code and turn it into genetic
code to actually write DNA this gives us
the ability to program cells to program
them from scratch with intention with
atomic control this is really powerful
stuff and I’ve been exploring this field
ever since 2003 when we wrapped up the
genome it’s what led me to this
phanie autodesk autodesk makes design
software ones and zeros we don’t
actually make physical products we make
design tools and that’s because to make
complex things like cars or buildings or
cities or to do visualization and
simulation that is photorealistic like
we use for movies you need really really
powerful software tools design tools
simulation tools and I knew that if if
it takes these types of tools to go and
design a car or a new phone we’re
definitely going to need this type of
tool to design a metabolic pathway or to
design a cell even a simple one I was
really fortunate that in 2009 I got to
meet the CEO and CTO of Autodesk Atta at
a function and I said to them I love
what your tools do but you only make
dead stuff do you want to make living
things too and instead of running they
said yeah that sounds really cool let’s
look into that and they looked into it
for almost three years and then they
found it a life science group to do
exactly that and I joined that group
right away and while I was waiting for
my HR paperwork to process I was sitting
in New York I was thinking about the
future and I thought man it’s time for
another genome project we need big
thinking again because since 2003 when
the last one wrapped up there was just
dead silence about what we were gonna do
next we’d gone into the world of omics
but what are a mix it’s just other data
Sciences I thought what if we what if
isn’t it time for another genome project
where now we write a human genome rather
than just read it what what
possibilities could open up if we did
that and I don’t mean and I’ll say this
right now make synthetic babies I’m
saying right the three billion base
pairs of
human genetic code accurately properly
put it into a cell and demonstrate that
it works runs the cell and allows the
cells to divide nothing happened after I
wrote that article who was kind of dead
air that was 2012 but in 2015 shortly
after I just done this orientation at
the White House about inspiring
inventors to go out and invent I end up
at a meeting for something called the
synthetic yeast project and this is
actually the most sophisticated genetic
engineering project on the planet
they’re synthesizing a yeast genome
which is about 12 million base pairs of
code that’s pretty cool
16 chromosomes yeast are more like us
than they are like bacteria and the
project was going well and I said well
what do you want to do next and they
asked me what do you want to do next
they say I think you should do the human
genome wrong audience it was like but I
noticed something all the old people
were kind of looking frightened and all
the young people were like oh because
the first genome project ignited my
career they saw the potential that this
could just open doors so I felt I had to
push the boundaries because again I had
this new ambassador position to go and
push people so I called up these two
scientists I called up George Church
he’s famous in genetics super open great
sense of humor open mind
you know just love the guy and I said
George you were part of the first genome
project I nominate you to be the leader
of the next genome project to write a
human genome and it took about 30
minutes on a phone call to forget him –
for him to say yes but he had one
condition he said the leader of the
yeast genome project that’s doing all
this amazing genetic engineering needs
to be a part of it that guy’s name is
dr. Jeff bucha and Jeff is at NYU and
he’s kind of the polar opposite of
George he’s he’s really quiet and
thoughtful and
really really thinks about things a long
time and he wasn’t so sure that this was
a good idea and that he wanted to attach
his name to it but he did after three
months of thinking about it
he saw the value and I have to hand it
to a nancy kelly a close friend that is
a lawyer and as really good at putting
scientists together and working with
them for for bringing Jeff in and
together we formed a little team of
people that created a nucleus for the
next genome project two world-class
scientists one crazy catalyst and a
lawyer that could do all the paperwork
and manage a complex project so we just
need one more thing money you always
need money to do anything so I went to
see this guy this is Carl bass and Carl
was the CEO of Autodesk at the time and
as you can see he’s a pretty casual guy
this is his work where and he’s a maker
and I I said Carl I you know I like to
chase cars I I think I caught a train
and I need some help he said what do you
need and I said I need some money
he goes how much I said Lots he goes
give me a number okay I said well I
think we can get going with a quarter
million dollars that’s enough to bring
scientists together let’s see if we
can’t kick started with that what else
do you need I need your rolodex because
I got to call a lot of people and ask
for more money and he said done he was a
seven minute conversation with that
check in hand things got rolling and we
started writing a white paper we started
organizing we started calling other
genetic scientists and thinking about
this paper week we talked to editors at
journals and we organized a meeting in
New York in May 2016
that got branded as secret we already
knew that putting human in front of
genome was going to be provocative for
people particularly when you add
synthesis but when you put secret in
front of it oh my god it’s so good
scientists don’t get any
tension and all of a sudden we got a
hundred million pageviews in 200
different news sources and suddenly
everyone was talking about the next
genome project so cool but it wasn’t
really secret that’s the I wish it was
but it was published just a few days
later and in fact we had a hundred and
thirty-five people at the meeting and
they’re tweeting it’s not like it’s that
secret but the genome project right was
published and honestly I wouldn’t have
thought in a million years that I’d end
up working with these eminent scientists
pushing them to do something like this
and getting them to think about this and
again we created a website around this
and started to pull people in and start
sharing information but everyone always
asked me why do this come on we make
human genomes all the time your genomes
were made we roll some dice in a bedroom
boom you got a human genome why do we
need to synthesize a human genome and
the fact is we don’t but we are
synthesizing viruses and bacteria and
reprogramming cells and there’s an
entire industry flourishing around this
and we don’t have things like standards
ethics international collaborations we
don’t have the networks of scientists
working together we don’t have the
funding to bring in people and engage
them and we weren’t communicating with
the public well most people had never
heard of synthetic biology this is just
an overview of some of the companies
that are doing cell reprogramming and
synthesis there’s more than I can keep
track of today it’s a growing industry
worth billions of dollars
and probably trillions in the future we
need the tools and the technology and a
framework for doing this type of
engineering because it’s possibly the
most powerful and important technology
humans have ever created CRISPR a gene
editing technology is all
already being used to do genetic
surgeries on human embryos and and for
many other tasks it’s an amazing
technology but what happens when we can
synthesize human genomes because every
time one of our cells divide a human
genome is written we need to start
thinking about this stuff now today ten
years early I’m not too worried about it
because this little girl my daughter
named Rosalind after one of the
scientists that was instrumental in
discovering the DNA molecule or or we
just call her row or row row row it was
my teacher she was made in an IVF lab in
new york ivf forty years ago was pretty
controversial it’s not today there’s
five million kids by ivf and i tell you
if we if they end up this way naturally
or if we do a little genetic surgery and
they end up this happy or even if i
upgraded her so she didn’t get things
like cancer can see in the dark
I’m a happy camper she’s teaching me but
there’s darker visions and if you’ve
seen this movie
you’ve probably touched on some of those
visions it’s a great movie by the way go
it’s probably the best movie and
bioengineering I’ve seen in 20 years but
here’s the truth biology is the only
sustainable technology that we have you
don’t have to mow down a rain forest you
just make the rain forest work for you
it’s infinitely scalable it’s not going
away it’s been around for four billion
years and it has a simple programming
language that is universal we’re adding
a billion people every 12 years still I
think this is the technology that heals
our world meets all of our needs gives
us a better standard of living
cures our diseases I hope that you learn
a little about synthetic biology I hope
you check out the genome project right
and the amazing people now
for 200 scientists from a hundred
institutions around the world that are
organizing I welcome you into my world
and when you look back in ten years
you’ll say he was right
dare to know
you
future
I like that it’s kind of fun I never
look backwards but the future is coming
at us faster and faster and I want to
walk you into my world now
I’m a little hard to define I’m part
scientist part businessman part mm-hmm
really a tinkerer I’ve pulled everything
apart that I’ve ever owned see how it
works with the exception of the cat
I usually describe myself as a cell
biologist and I want to introduce you to
my little friends because we’re all used
to our cell phones but these cells which
are the really the foundation of every
living thing on this planet are really
unknown to most people and that’s
because they’re microscopic we didn’t
even know they existed until about 400
years ago and as you can see they’re
doing a lot of stuff there’s a lot of
things going on in these cells they’re
manufacturing proteins and lipids and
organizing copying DNA and separating
the chromosomes as the cells divide
these are the most powerful little
factories on the planet these can make
thousands of different compounds these
have been around for four billion years
in an unbroken chain of life that
continues to branch out and create new
forms cell biology is absolutely
beautiful and it’s addicting if you
start looking under a microscope at
these little organisms whether they be
bacterial single cells or eukaryotic
cells like the cells that make us cells
are so complex cells are so mysterious
remember we’ve only known about them for
four hundred years and we haven’t had
great tools to look at them
we still ascribe their creation to
deities we still look at we we we say to
scientists if they try and monkey with
this cell that they are playing God it’s
remarkable
and yet these cells are everywhere we
have 50 trillion cells in our own body
and scientists tell us we may have 10
times more bacterial cells in and on us
cells are everywhere now we’ve been D
convoluting the wiring of cells for as
long as we’ve known about them
we’ve started to map the biochemistry
and it’s all tangled it’s like it’s like
trying to untangle the ingredients in a
bubbling pot of soup but we’re getting
pretty good at it because we’re learning
how to share information and record it
in computers this is that wiring D
convoluted this is really the wiring
diagram of a eukaryotic cell this is
from a from a database it’s the overview
the high-level overview and it’s really
the sum total of thousands of scientists
working decades putting all this
together now you can drill into this
database here I’m just going into one
particular sugar pathway that generates
different molecules and you can start to
see every compound every chemical that’s
made and every enzyme catalyzing every
reaction this is a remarkable data asset
and it’s available to everyone and this
is really again it’s like looking at a
complex wiring diagram of an of a
computer chip or a car but more than
that we can actually go down into the
code the genetic code that makes all of
these reactions all this biochemistry
all this magic and that’s because of
this project that was started conceived
in the 1980s a long time ago started a
formally in 1990 first draft completed
in 2000 and all the t’s crossed and and
essentially the project wrapped up in
2003 that’s a long time ago 14 years
since this wrapped up but it hasn’t
really stopped it just keeps it was just
really the starting point for what we
know with genomics the human genome
project was successful because of the
promise of sequencing the human genome
the scientists said look it’s going to
be expensive we figure it’ll cost about
three billion dollars we figure it’ll
take 15 years but if we can read the
of a human being we’ll know more about
cancer we’ll know more about health
we’ll we’ll just what what could be more
powerful than understanding the program
that makes people most of us has never
looked at this data now we end up with
technology that is accelerating to
generate this type of data the first
genome was 3 billion dollars the second
one was about a hundred million dollars
and I just had my genome sequenced a few
months ago for under a thousand dollars
there’s there’s been very few
technologies this may be the only
technology that has ever decreased in
price and increased in performance so
fast that most of us don’t use know
about or care about this is remarkable
but things are shifting we’re not just
reading genomes anymore which today is
informing things like our cancer
treatments telling us what microbes are
in the environment allowing us to really
understand their food crops etc now we
have been have got tools to actually
start writing genomes and I don’t mean
modifying genomes modifying genomes the
way it used to be done remember we’ve
been doing genetic engineering since the
1970s modifying genomes is really just
flipping a couple of bits here and
they’re reorganizing a few things adding
in one new trait or ability maybe a few
I’m talking we actually have tools now
that allow us to take electronic data
electronic code and turn it into genetic
code to actually write DNA this gives us
the ability to program cells to program
them from scratch with intention with
atomic control this is really powerful
stuff and I’ve been exploring this field
ever since 2003 when we wrapped up the
genome it’s what led me to this
phanie autodesk autodesk makes design
software ones and zeros we don’t
actually make physical products we make
design tools and that’s because to make
complex things like cars or buildings or
cities or to do visualization and
simulation that is photorealistic like
we use for movies you need really really
powerful software tools design tools
simulation tools and I knew that if if
it takes these types of tools to go and
design a car or a new phone we’re
definitely going to need this type of
tool to design a metabolic pathway or to
design a cell even a simple one I was
really fortunate that in 2009 I got to
meet the CEO and CTO of Autodesk Atta at
a function and I said to them I love
what your tools do but you only make
dead stuff do you want to make living
things too and instead of running they
said yeah that sounds really cool let’s
look into that and they looked into it
for almost three years and then they
found it a life science group to do
exactly that and I joined that group
right away and while I was waiting for
my HR paperwork to process I was sitting
in New York I was thinking about the
future and I thought man it’s time for
another genome project we need big
thinking again because since 2003 when
the last one wrapped up there was just
dead silence about what we were gonna do
next we’d gone into the world of omics
but what are a mix it’s just other data
Sciences I thought what if we what if
isn’t it time for another genome project
where now we write a human genome rather
than just read it what what
possibilities could open up if we did
that and I don’t mean and I’ll say this
right now make synthetic babies I’m
saying right the three billion base
pairs of
human genetic code accurately properly
put it into a cell and demonstrate that
it works runs the cell and allows the
cells to divide nothing happened after I
wrote that article who was kind of dead
air that was 2012 but in 2015 shortly
after I just done this orientation at
the White House about inspiring
inventors to go out and invent I end up
at a meeting for something called the
synthetic yeast project and this is
actually the most sophisticated genetic
engineering project on the planet
they’re synthesizing a yeast genome
which is about 12 million base pairs of
code that’s pretty cool
16 chromosomes yeast are more like us
than they are like bacteria and the
project was going well and I said well
what do you want to do next and they
asked me what do you want to do next
they say I think you should do the human
genome wrong audience it was like but I
noticed something all the old people
were kind of looking frightened and all
the young people were like oh because
the first genome project ignited my
career they saw the potential that this
could just open doors so I felt I had to
push the boundaries because again I had
this new ambassador position to go and
push people so I called up these two
scientists I called up George Church
he’s famous in genetics super open great
sense of humor open mind
you know just love the guy and I said
George you were part of the first genome
project I nominate you to be the leader
of the next genome project to write a
human genome and it took about 30
minutes on a phone call to forget him –
for him to say yes but he had one
condition he said the leader of the
yeast genome project that’s doing all
this amazing genetic engineering needs
to be a part of it that guy’s name is
dr. Jeff bucha and Jeff is at NYU and
he’s kind of the polar opposite of
George he’s he’s really quiet and
thoughtful and
really really thinks about things a long
time and he wasn’t so sure that this was
a good idea and that he wanted to attach
his name to it but he did after three
months of thinking about it
he saw the value and I have to hand it
to a nancy kelly a close friend that is
a lawyer and as really good at putting
scientists together and working with
them for for bringing Jeff in and
together we formed a little team of
people that created a nucleus for the
next genome project two world-class
scientists one crazy catalyst and a
lawyer that could do all the paperwork
and manage a complex project so we just
need one more thing money you always
need money to do anything so I went to
see this guy this is Carl bass and Carl
was the CEO of Autodesk at the time and
as you can see he’s a pretty casual guy
this is his work where and he’s a maker
and I I said Carl I you know I like to
chase cars I I think I caught a train
and I need some help he said what do you
need and I said I need some money
he goes how much I said Lots he goes
give me a number okay I said well I
think we can get going with a quarter
million dollars that’s enough to bring
scientists together let’s see if we
can’t kick started with that what else
do you need I need your rolodex because
I got to call a lot of people and ask
for more money and he said done he was a
seven minute conversation with that
check in hand things got rolling and we
started writing a white paper we started
organizing we started calling other
genetic scientists and thinking about
this paper week we talked to editors at
journals and we organized a meeting in
New York in May 2016
that got branded as secret we already
knew that putting human in front of
genome was going to be provocative for
people particularly when you add
synthesis but when you put secret in
front of it oh my god it’s so good
scientists don’t get any
tension and all of a sudden we got a
hundred million pageviews in 200
different news sources and suddenly
everyone was talking about the next
genome project so cool but it wasn’t
really secret that’s the I wish it was
but it was published just a few days
later and in fact we had a hundred and
thirty-five people at the meeting and
they’re tweeting it’s not like it’s that
secret but the genome project right was
published and honestly I wouldn’t have
thought in a million years that I’d end
up working with these eminent scientists
pushing them to do something like this
and getting them to think about this and
again we created a website around this
and started to pull people in and start
sharing information but everyone always
asked me why do this come on we make
human genomes all the time your genomes
were made we roll some dice in a bedroom
boom you got a human genome why do we
need to synthesize a human genome and
the fact is we don’t but we are
synthesizing viruses and bacteria and
reprogramming cells and there’s an
entire industry flourishing around this
and we don’t have things like standards
ethics international collaborations we
don’t have the networks of scientists
working together we don’t have the
funding to bring in people and engage
them and we weren’t communicating with
the public well most people had never
heard of synthetic biology this is just
an overview of some of the companies
that are doing cell reprogramming and
synthesis there’s more than I can keep
track of today it’s a growing industry
worth billions of dollars
and probably trillions in the future we
need the tools and the technology and a
framework for doing this type of
engineering because it’s possibly the
most powerful and important technology
humans have ever created CRISPR a gene
editing technology is all
already being used to do genetic
surgeries on human embryos and and for
many other tasks it’s an amazing
technology but what happens when we can
synthesize human genomes because every
time one of our cells divide a human
genome is written we need to start
thinking about this stuff now today ten
years early I’m not too worried about it
because this little girl my daughter
named Rosalind after one of the
scientists that was instrumental in
discovering the DNA molecule or or we
just call her row or row row row it was
my teacher she was made in an IVF lab in
new york ivf forty years ago was pretty
controversial it’s not today there’s
five million kids by ivf and i tell you
if we if they end up this way naturally
or if we do a little genetic surgery and
they end up this happy or even if i
upgraded her so she didn’t get things
like cancer can see in the dark
I’m a happy camper she’s teaching me but
there’s darker visions and if you’ve
seen this movie
you’ve probably touched on some of those
visions it’s a great movie by the way go
it’s probably the best movie and
bioengineering I’ve seen in 20 years but
here’s the truth biology is the only
sustainable technology that we have you
don’t have to mow down a rain forest you
just make the rain forest work for you
it’s infinitely scalable it’s not going
away it’s been around for four billion
years and it has a simple programming
language that is universal we’re adding
a billion people every 12 years still I
think this is the technology that heals
our world meets all of our needs gives
us a better standard of living
cures our diseases I hope that you learn
a little about synthetic biology I hope
you check out the genome project right
and the amazing people now
for 200 scientists from a hundred
institutions around the world that are
organizing I welcome you into my world
and when you look back in ten years
you’ll say he was right
dare to know
you
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