Biotechnology explained

There is no end to innovation and it is more transversal than ever before. Google, NASA and Singularity University have described biotech, neurotech and nanotech as three of today’s most important exponential trends and the backbone of radical innovation. The convergence of these technologies promises to fundamentally change all aspects of our lives.

Biotech – life as technology

In biotechnology, imagination is just as important as science. It is a complex technology with the potential to transform it to our advantage. To manipulate life itself, scientists need to link the best quantum computers to innovative nanotechnology and advances in biology and chemistry. In this context, biotechnology also underscores the growing trend that science and engineering are increasingly linked to each other and to the fastest computers – which have an increasing processing capacity. Moreover, when this stimulates our imagination, it can lead to very interesting possibilities.

Researchers at the University of California in San Francisco, and its affiliated Gladstone Institutes, recently used a ‘gene assembly platform’ called CRISPR to copy T cells from people genetically immune to the effects of HIV. By modifying the cells of ‘ordinary’ people, it is possible to transfer this genetic resistance to them. Imagine that thanks to this breakthrough you can be vaccinated against HIV in the future! That is just the beginning of this fantastic trend.

The future of biotechnology

We can expect extensive biotech research into the most urgent health problems in the coming decades. Over the next ten to twenty years, we may be able to cure the most common forms of cancer and heart disease, prevent Alzheimer’s disease and eradicate severe forms of autism. Researchers are making such great advances in biotechnology that they are close to breakthroughs on which action can be taken soon.

Guoping Feng and a research team at MIT, for example, have shown that they can reduce behavioural symptoms of autism in mice. The Shank3 gene is a protein that allows neurons to communicate with one other. By stopping this gene during embryonic development but giving it all the space it needs in the first phase of life, they can influence the way autism expresses itself. During follow-up research at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis (WUSTL), another gene related to autism was identified. This neurofibromatosis type 1 gene (NF1) is also responsible for a rare form of cancer. Stephanie Morris, one of the investigators, explains: “Our research also shows that this single gene is also related to abnormalities in the autism spectrum in the same patients. This allows us to go back to the beginning of the DNA strand to discover if there are shared patterns that contribute to autism in a wider part of the population”. The fact that this single gene is closely related to autism could potentially mean a cure for autism in the future.

As the world’s aging population increases, so does the number of age-related illnesses. It is known that the deterioration of health is related to cell aging, where the cells no longer divide and become permanent. These aging cells are at the basis of diseases such as osteoporosis, cataracts and arteriosclerosis. Scientists have so far hardly dared to do anything about this, for fear that the cells will start dividing faster and uncontrollably, which will increase the risk of cancer. But that’s in the past.

Researchers from the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine have found a solution for this problem. Instead of trying to change the behavior of these problematic cells, they decided to remove them. During preliminary research with laboratory mice, published in ‘Nature’ in 2016, they discovered that rinsing out the old cells twice a week resulted in fewer heart, kidney and eye diseases. The life expectancy of laboratory mice also increased by a third.

The Mayo Clinic was so impressed with the results that it supported the creation of Unity Biotechnology, a startup partly funded by Jeff Bezos (Amazon). In addition, a start has been made with the preparation of testing this technique on humans. The main goal is not to increase our life expectancy – which is likely to happen anyway – but above all to increase out the quality of life. Imagine turning 150, but still feeling 35! This might be closer than you think.

Over the next ten to twenty years, we may be able to cure the most common forms of cancer and heart disease, prevent Alzheimer’s disease and eradicate severe forms of autism.