Bioengineering is the new frontier in advanced technology: Kiran Mazumdar Shaw
Posted on November 26, 2024 Updated on November 24, 2024
Digital technologies have transformed biology research to provide in-depth insights into unravelling the mysteries of living systems. Bioengineering is the new frontier in advanced technology, said Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, chairperson, Biocon Group and Association of Biotechnology Led Enterprises (ABLE).
Genetic engineering has unleashed a power house of bio manufacturing in the fermentation industry. Beer and wine making were the oldest large scale bio manufacturing known to man where yeasts were harnessed to convert sugar to ethanol. Today, yeasts, bacteria, plants, insects and mammalian cells are being engineered to produce drugs, food, proteins, biomaterials and biofuels, she added.
Gene editing through CRISPR and predictive protein structure software like Alphafold are accelerating the pace and precision of genetic engineering. At the Bangalore Technology Summit, the Biocon Group chief in her opening address at the session titled Bio-manufacturing E3-Towards Viksit Bharat said that Bengaluru has the scientific acumen to join the global effort in advancing technology to the next level. From brain research to robotics, we have both academic and industrial efforts in translating science into technology.
ARTPARK in IISc and IBAB are emerging as centres of excellence in cutting edge areas of computational sciences. This AI Robotics Technology Park hub is an incubation and accelerator program designed to facilitate the evolution of a start-up from innovation. What we need is to blur the lines between academic & industry research through cross border faculty exchanges where academicians take a sabbatical to work at industry and vice versa. This is because scientists do not understand the business of science and business needs to understand science at a deeper level, she noted.
If the discovery of DNA by Watson & Crick broke the genetic code of life in 1953, its quantum computing that will unlock the pathways and networks of electrical chemical and protein signalling that makes living systems function. The human body is the largest and most complex data lake that is sorted, segregated and analysed in nano seconds to deliver inference. To think that quantum computing is done at ambient temperature and pressure is all the more marvellous, said Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw.
When it comes to learning living systems, act on genetic memory and acquired memory. Eg Birds migrate on genetic memory but learn to catch the worm through practice of acquired memory. AI is based on iterative LLM (local language models) and lacks intuitive intelligence which living systems have through genetic memory encoded in their DNA. AI memory chips of the future will need to embed such genetic memory where DNA could play the interface role, she said.
The Biocon and ABLE chief was considering whether the Global Capability Centres (GCCs) could initiate this at a scale in critical technologies. We have an opportunity as new biology is a sunrise of sector and there is need to call for request for proposals to seek government grants. India is a leading destination for bioinnovation and bio-manufacturing. The country is investing in R&D capabilities and healthcare infrastructure.
Now technology plus talent are the drivers of robotics & wearables, cell therapies, synthetic biology and brain research. All this is happening because bioengineering is the new frontier in advanced technology, she said.
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