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I'm working on synthesizing a genome at home! Here is a video with more details, as well as a picture of my home lab. I've always wanted to build life from scra

by koeng 2y ago

I'm working on synthesizing a genome at home! Here is a video with more details, as well as a picture of my home lab. I've always wanted to build life from scratch, and I finally have a chance to do it. Video on what I'm doing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCiuS1oHnKw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCiuS1oHnKw Picture of my home lab - https://x.com/koeng101/status/1844150979484319842 https://x.com/koeng101/status/1844150979484319842 I'm trying to build a DNA assembly company right now (been lots of ups and downs lately...), and one thing I need to do is validate the specs of my oligo pool synthesis provider, Agilent, before I release to customers / raise a seed round. So as a stress-test run of my system, I'm synthesizing a genome, and am thinking about trying to livestream it. The unique technology is variety of ways to assemble and validate DNA from oligo pools for a lot cheaper, pretty much enabling a 10x reduction in DNA synthesis cost vs commercial suppliers. I've worked my ass off for nearly 2 years to get to this moment and am so excited!

mindcrime 2y ago
> I've always wanted to build life from scratch, and I finally have a chance to do it. I'm pretty sure I saw this movie... and it didn't end well for existing life on Earth, as I recall. :p
- koeng 2y ago
  good thing we live in real life and not a movie
  - mindcrime 2y ago
    Reality is often stranger than fiction though! :-)
    - kragen 2y ago
      Less in keeping with the anti-intellectual witch-hunting political agendas of Hollywood, though.
- circles_for-day 2y ago
  Don’t worry, synthetic life doesn’t work very well without evolution to tune it into a useful ecological niche. Venter already did something similar. Tampering with existing viruses and symbionts so they can escape their current minima in the fitness landscape is the more dangerous thing.
  - koeng 2y ago
    In this case, it is literally the Venter genome, just with removed tRNAs / codon sets. I'm collaborating with them on it (they're just doing the final transformation).
cgreerrun 2y ago
This is incredible. I have a biochemistry and bioinformatics background, and I've always been curious about how easy and cheap it could be to do various experiments at home. Godspeed!
0xCMP 2y ago
a literal home lab!
- 0xEF 2y ago
  My favorite piece of lab equipment is the bed.
owenpalmer 2y ago
Wow this is very exciting! Always makes me happy when I see your comments on HN, you're always up to something interesting! Are you hiring developers or aspiring bioengineers? (I'm a developer and an aspiring bioengineer)
- koeng 2y ago
  Someday hopefully soon when I raise a seed :) I think if you have the right structure, it is easier to train developers to be bioengineers than bioengineers to be developers! Bioengineering tends to be a more wicked discipline, which seriously affects how one writes their code. Makes it kinda crap. Software devs on the other hand typically aren't as experienced in the other field, and so are coming in blind.
  - Dig1t 2y ago
    How about free labor? Are you interested in people who want to work for free?
    - koeng 2y ago
      Definitely, producing open source works that would help me! Feel free to send me an email and we can talk about what makes sense to you. Also put some more above.
  - owenpalmer 2y ago
    That's encouraging! The barrier of entry for BioE feels very high compared to software. What do you think is a good way to make a transition between them? Also, I second what Dig1t said. I would gladly get involved and volunteer my time and skills, just to get my foot in the door. Would contributing to dnadesign be a good place to start?
    - koeng 2y ago
      Definitely! If you're willing to help, throw me an email so we can talk where it would best fit for you :) some sets of problems I have right now (on the hardware / software side): Hardware: It'd be great to have an open source plate gripper. I wrote a little bit about the general problem of transferring here - https://keonigandall.com/posts/transfer_problem.html https://keonigandall.com/posts/transfer_problem.html . I have a uarm lite6, but wanted to investigate building an arctos robotic arm to move plates between machines. Just need the gripper! This is something I cannot do myself - I have software skills, and can build things with my hands, but have zero skills on designing new hardware. Software: A lot more here, but depends on interests. I have some general life-improvements I'm looking at doing, but also some wild ideas that need prototyping
paulmilligrams 2y ago
Very impressive work. Are you still able to proceed with operating your lab despite the injunction passed against you for theft of trade secrets? [1] [1] https://www.sideman.com/ronald-fisher-and-ellen-leonida-achieve-a-win-for-trilobio/ https://www.sideman.com/ronald-fisher-and-ellen-leonida-achi...
- koeng 2y ago
  yep, nothing in there prevents me from doing work. That article is mainly their legal team fluffing their own feathers for their clients, which I'd hope that one would be able to read between the lines for, considering it was published by the lawyers themselves. The lawsuit itself is quite frivolous and accusing me of stealing and using source code I didn't steal/use, so just have to go through the legal motions to prove that. The more details you know about the case the more absurd it becomes
  - worthless-trash 2y ago
    I hope you win and get some big cash rewards for these kinds of accusations.
TechDebtDevin 2y ago
Very cool, I wish you the best of luck. Fuck Trilobio
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

by koeng 2y ago

mindcrime 2y ago

> I've always wanted to build life from scratch, and I finally have a chance to do it. I'm pretty sure I saw this movie... and it didn't end well for existing life on Earth, as I recall. :p

koeng 2y ago
good thing we live in real life and not a movie
- mindcrime 2y ago
  Reality is often stranger than fiction though! :-)
  - kragen 2y ago
    Less in keeping with the anti-intellectual witch-hunting political agendas of Hollywood, though.
circles_for-day 2y ago
Don’t worry, synthetic life doesn’t work very well without evolution to tune it into a useful ecological niche. Venter already did something similar. Tampering with existing viruses and symbionts so they can escape their current minima in the fitness landscape is the more dangerous thing.
- koeng 2y ago
  In this case, it is literally the Venter genome, just with removed tRNAs / codon sets. I'm collaborating with them on it (they're just doing the final transformation).

cgreerrun 2y ago

This is incredible. I have a biochemistry and bioinformatics background, and I've always been curious about how easy and cheap it could be to do various experiments at home. Godspeed!

0xCMP 2y ago

a literal home lab!

0xEF 2y ago
My favorite piece of lab equipment is the bed.

owenpalmer 2y ago

Wow this is very exciting! Always makes me happy when I see your comments on HN, you're always up to something interesting! Are you hiring developers or aspiring bioengineers? (I'm a developer and an aspiring bioengineer)

koeng 2y ago
Someday hopefully soon when I raise a seed :) I think if you have the right structure, it is easier to train developers to be bioengineers than bioengineers to be developers! Bioengineering tends to be a more wicked discipline, which seriously affects how one writes their code. Makes it kinda crap. Software devs on the other hand typically aren't as experienced in the other field, and so are coming in blind.
- Dig1t 2y ago
  How about free labor? Are you interested in people who want to work for free?
  - koeng 2y ago
    Definitely, producing open source works that would help me! Feel free to send me an email and we can talk about what makes sense to you. Also put some more above.
- owenpalmer 2y ago
  That's encouraging! The barrier of entry for BioE feels very high compared to software. What do you think is a good way to make a transition between them? Also, I second what Dig1t said. I would gladly get involved and volunteer my time and skills, just to get my foot in the door. Would contributing to dnadesign be a good place to start?
  - koeng 2y ago
    Definitely! If you're willing to help, throw me an email so we can talk where it would best fit for you :) some sets of problems I have right now (on the hardware / software side): Hardware: It'd be great to have an open source plate gripper. I wrote a little bit about the general problem of transferring here - https://keonigandall.com/posts/transfer_problem.html https://keonigandall.com/posts/transfer_problem.html . I have a uarm lite6, but wanted to investigate building an arctos robotic arm to move plates between machines. Just need the gripper! This is something I cannot do myself - I have software skills, and can build things with my hands, but have zero skills on designing new hardware. Software: A lot more here, but depends on interests. I have some general life-improvements I'm looking at doing, but also some wild ideas that need prototyping

paulmilligrams 2y ago

Very impressive work. Are you still able to proceed with operating your lab despite the injunction passed against you for theft of trade secrets? [1] [1] https://www.sideman.com/ronald-fisher-and-ellen-leonida-achieve-a-win-for-trilobio/ https://www.sideman.com/ronald-fisher-and-ellen-leonida-achi...

koeng 2y ago
yep, nothing in there prevents me from doing work. That article is mainly their legal team fluffing their own feathers for their clients, which I'd hope that one would be able to read between the lines for, considering it was published by the lawyers themselves. The lawsuit itself is quite frivolous and accusing me of stealing and using source code I didn't steal/use, so just have to go through the legal motions to prove that. The more details you know about the case the more absurd it becomes
- worthless-trash 2y ago
  I hope you win and get some big cash rewards for these kinds of accusations.

TechDebtDevin 2y ago

Very cool, I wish you the best of luck. Fuck Trilobio

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]