A rare opportunity

For all that I grouse about working for a giant corporation, being part of an organization with vast resources does have its occasional perks. I experienced one of those perks this morning. I attended the inaugural presentation of a series of presentations from outside experts. As with most things innovation related, I was skeptical, but I'm also not one to pass on the opportunity to listen to an expert describe their work. The presentation was by Juan Enriquez. I had never heard of him, but I am familiar with one of his pet projects. He's part of the team that developed the first artificial organism.

The talk was excellent. He's presented at TED a few times, and his presentation skills reflect this level of experience. He's also very convincing. I've never really bought into the hype around the potential of artificial organisms, but he almost managed to level my doubts with his well designed slides and fascinating arguments about the role of codes in our technology. I held on though, and managed to craft a fairly intelligent question. I'm not usually one to ask questions in this type of forum, but when would I ever have another opportunity to directly address a leader in biotechnology and genomics?

We viewed the presentation over an internet broadcast so I had to get on the mic and pose my question through a camera. The presentation was heavy on how the genetic code can be used to achieve tremendous breakthroughs with significant wealth creation. Understand the code and create wealth was one of the major themes of the presentation. He also spent a good chunk of the talk on the role of information flow through through networks. The genetic code is a linear and relatively simple system that creates a highly nonlinear and complex network. In creating an organism to produce fuel or medicines, the linear genetic code would need to changed, but how would that change impact the networks that form as a consequence of genetic information?

He didn't really answer my question, but his response implicitly acknowledged the premise of my question. He talked about the redundancy of biological systems and the challenge of building up knowledge from the genetic to the systems level. Making an organism do our bidding is far more complex than simply manipulating a few lines of genetic code. In accepting that challenge, Enriquez views this complexity as an opportunity to develop radically new technologies. Where I see the complexity of life as a mystery that will thwart our attempts to bend it to our will, he sees the opportunity available to somebody willing to dedicate themselves to the challenge.

In thinking about his talk and my challenge to his premise, I realized that much of what I've been yearning for over the last year or so is the opportunity to work on a big problem. I'm not looking for more little puzzles that will yield some insights with a few simple experiments, but I need something that will require concerted, focused effort for decades. I want to test my skills against a big, hairy, audacious problem. I need it. I will never be the scientist and leader that I am capable of becoming if I don't pursue answers to the Big Questions.