A POST-PANDEMIC D.O.S.E
Dopamine, Oxytocin, Serotonin, and Endorphins from attending SynBioBeta’s Built with Biology 2022 in-person Conference
I was wearing a baggy blue jumpsuit — a size 18 — think ghost-busters or jet plane pilot, with orange NASA vans and my brown bangs and a blonde bob hair cut out for show. I was at a semi-formal mixer in the top floor of the Marriot Hotel in Oakland, California. That was the start of my Built With Biology Conference experience, a conference that celebrates the companies that use Biology “to make the planet a better place.”
Converting the 2D versions of individuals from zoom calls held prior to the in-person event, into a living, breathing — and often way taller than I expected — physical body, was a truly surreal experience. A serotonin explosion. No, seriously, serotonin, the social chemical or what makes you friendly, was everywhere, tattooed on people’s wrists and worn as earrings.
A buzzing energy of world changers, everyone in that exhibition hallway was indeed changing the world. One start-up at a time.
Turn left, enter a dark room, and see fluorescent petunias that may one day in the future light up our streets. Turn right, and touch bricks and leather made out of mushrooms as sustainable alternatives, from building materials and clothing, all the way to BACON. Automated robotic laboratories, sustainably produced natural food dyes and pigments from algae, “molecular coffee” or coffee without coffee beans, modular bio-labs in the form of domes to decentralise science, and DNA as the future of digital data storage and computation. Big, big problems.
But also smaller problems, like kambucha-made rolling paper that was passed around as an empty joint in a glass tube, as well as little Alice in Wonderland- looking bottles that contained a probiotic drink that prevents hangovers.
Some products ready for the market, like bio-manufactured materials specifically designed for skiing boards. Others, not so ready, displaying a tiny brain chip in a rather large resin (see image below), which at first was very misleading as I was very much considering a tiny chip in the grand schemes of tapping into my dreams and communication via telepath; only to find out that a device much more of the size of the resin needs to be surgically implanted into my skull…not so ready.
My favourite observation was that no one was really attending the talks, but rather making up for two-years of post pandemic trauma and deprivation from human interaction, by engaging with one another , getting their D.O.S.E (Dopamine, Oxytocin, Serotonin, and Endorphins)— so much so, that by the third day of the conference everyone was “dragging” and helplessly trying to extend their social batteries.
The diffusion of artists within the bio-space and the vibrant energy from the 300 or so students that were funded by Ginkgo Bioworks and Schmidt Futures to attend the “Race Against the Clock” networking event, transformed what could have been a very dry conference into what turned out to be a hub for social and sustainable change via biology.
Now, how does a Security and Crime Science doctorate researcher introduce themselves in a synthetic biology conference?
A keen (bio)bean, I was ultra excited this year and hoping to see a more proactive approach to biosecurity. I noticed that there was a “Red Teaming” panel discussion — the adversarial approach to assessing the security of a technology and/or system — and got psyched that what I thought I was preaching alone about throughout my PhD journey was finally reaching the people who are actually making the science. It wasn’t enough though. Despite coming out of a real-world live example of how vulnerable we all are to biological threats, the panel discussed super important concepts but there was no engagement — or rather no audience apart from my own keen (bio)bean self.
Speaking of engagement, the usual representation from government did not make their appearance this year, apart from the Department of Commerce and there was probably more talk about Elizabeth Holmes, Fraud and Theranos than there was an interest in acknowledging our incapability of determining the origins of the COVID-19 virus..
BUT. And this is a positive but. There was ample of appetite in response to my perpetual pitching to “making biosecurity cool” — enter shameless plug to bronic, a growing community of futurists who care about cyber-bio security and everything in between. A community you can be a part of! With the aim of addressing the need for building and sustaining a skilled workforce of professionals in the Life Science with security acumen and relevant security actors with an understanding of the Life sciences, so that future threats can be better anticipated and solutions designed. Sign up by following this link or by scanning the QR code in the image below! https://vcx1vh0xjld.typeform.com/to/W4NOEzXN
Don’t forget to follow bronic at: https://twitter.com/Bronic_co
Get Mariam Elgabry’s stories in your inbox
