Lifeboat Foundation

When the future of genetic engineering arrived on Sebastian Cocioba’s doorstep, it was affixed to the back of a postcard from Austria with a little bit of packing tape.

Cocioba is a 25-year-old college dropout whose primary interest is tinkering with plant genetics in a lab he cobbled together from eBay. The lab is located in the spare bedroom of his parent’s lavish apartment in Long Island City, across the river from Manhattan. A few months ago, an internet friend from an online bio-hacking forum had sent him the lab’s latest addition: attached to that postcard was Crispr-Cas9.

Genetic traits ranging from height to lactose tolerance and menopause onset have changed in the blink of an evolutionary eye.

Bioquark Inc. (www.bioquark.com) Interview in MoneyWeek

Read whole story: http://moneyweek.com/who-wants-to-live-forever/

Why compliance exist.

Gingko Bioworks launched their new laboratory last month—an automated “factory” that mass-produces genetically modified organisms. The organism company’s tagline is “Biology By Design,” and it aims to deliver just that in their second foundry, which is equipped with numerous robots that mash together huge batches of genes to churn out new and exotic lifeforms […] Gingko is ambitiously working through the complexities of biology and genetics to create these experimental organisms. The company boasts of a design-build-test cycle: gene-enzyme mixes designed from the company’s scientific database is put together in a hundred different ways, and the “mashup” that services a client’s needs best is accepted as the new organism’s genetic profile. Their new liquid-handling robots like the Echo 525 make large-scale experimentation possible. (READ MORE)

Continue reading “As In The Days Of Noah—New Synthetic Biology Factory Will Design, Build, And Test Exotic New Lifeforms” »

Continue reading “10 companies that want to make chemotherapy easier for patients — Bioquark Inc.” »

Today I’m announcing a $100M commitment to Kernel in an effort to enhance human intelligence and reimagine our future. Unlocking our brain is the most significant and consequential opportunity in history — and it’s time sensitive.

We’re starting to identify the mechanisms underlying neural code and make them programmable. Our biology and genetics have become increasingly programmable; our neural code is next in line. Programming our neural code will enable us to author ourselves and our existence in ways that were previously unimaginable.

I started Kernel in 2016 (read more at the Washington Post) to build the world’s first neural prosthetic for human intelligence enhancement. The investment I’m making in Kernel today will expedite the development of this prosthetic and similarly transformative neurotechnologies.

Continue reading “Kernel’s Quest to Enhance Human Intelligence” »

The idea of a genetic mutation spreading rapidly through a population isn’t as far-fetched a possibility as it once was.

Gene therapy in a box could reduce costs and save lives.

Gene therapy — the process of genetically altering cells to treat disease — is a highly promising process being studied as a way to cure devastating conditions like genetic disorders, HIV, and even cancer.

But despite the great need for medical advances in these areas, gene therapy can only be performed at a handful of high-tech clinics around the world and require highly trained staff, meaning that it may never be accessible to the millions of people whose lives it could save.

Continue reading “Newly-developed ‘gene therapy in a box’ could save millions of lives” »

Scientists at Boston Children’s Hospital identified a defect that causes a genetic disorder in 50% of autism sufferers — and two existing classes of drugs that counter the defect.