News

Interview with Chris Simms for New Scientist about the J. Craig Venter Institute’s recent preprint on synthetic genomics and genome transplantation, and the broader implications for whole-genome synthesis and bottom-up genome design. Read at New Scientist →

Presented our multi-omics-guided genome synthesis technology at the 2025 AIChE Annual Meeting in Boston. Read at AIChE 2025 →

Presented research goals for the independent laboratory at the American Institute of Chemical Engineers’ Annual Meeting in Boston — Meet the Faculty Candidates poster session. Read at AIChE 2025 →

Honored to receive the 2025 Rising Stars in Engineering in Health Award from Columbia Engineering BME, the Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering at Cornell University, Johns Hopkins Biomedical Engineering, and the Boston University College of Engineering.

Chairing the Synthetic Biology for Drug Discovery & Development Symposium at Discovery on Target 2025.

Interview with Carl Zimmer for The New York Times about engineering the genetic code and the creation of radically engineered synthetic genomes. Read at The New York Times →

Article and Nature interview by Michael Eisenstein summarizing the current state, challenges, and recent developments in whole-genome synthesis and bottom-up genome design, including our work on a 61-codon recoded E. coli and the multi-omics-guided rescue strategies that make highly recoded genomes viable. Nature 638, 848-850 (2025). Read at Nature →...

On November 21, presented our Biocontainment and Genetic Firewall K99/R00 Project at the 2024 NIH Synthetic Biology Consortium Meeting in Rockville, MD. Talk recording now available. Read at NIH SynBio Consortium →

Presenting the Biocontainment and Genetic Firewall K99/R00 Project at the 2024 NIH Synthetic Biology Consortium Meeting in Rockville, MD. Read at NIH SynBio Consortium →

Presenting our genetic-code-engineering work at the 12th International mRNA Health Conference. Read at mRNA Health Conference →

Chairing the Synthetic Biology for Drug Discovery and Therapy session at Discovery on Target 2024.

Speaker at the Distinguished Young Scholars Seminar Series, University of Washington.

Creating a Virus-Resistant Bacterium Using a Synthetic Engineered Genome — U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science highlight on our 2023 Nature paper. Read at U.S. DOE Office of Science →

Our amino-acid-swapped genetic code work was selected as one of the most important discoveries at Harvard Medical School in 2023 by Harvard Medicine News. Read at Harvard Medicine News →

New Synthetic E. coli Is Immune to Bacteriophage Infection. Interview with Anna Napolitano for The Scientist. Read at The Scientist →

Coverage in Nature Biotechnology of our amino-acid-swapped genetic code work and its implications for virus-resistant biomanufacturing. Read at Nature Biotechnology →

New Scientist coverage of our 2023 Nature paper on a swapped genetic code that prevents viral infections and gene transfer. Read at New Scientist →

Editorial highlight in Synthetic Biology of our work on virus-resistant, transgene-contained E. coli. Read at Synthetic Biology (OUP) →

Feature in Science by Robert F. Service on our amino-acid-swapped E. coli and the prospects for virus-resistant biomanufacturing chassis. Read at Science →

Nature News & Views commentary by Benjamin A. Blount on our paper A swapped genetic code prevents viral infections and gene transfer. Nature 615, 592-594 (2023). Read at Nature News & Views →

George Church’s Lab Engineers Virus-Resistant Bacterium with Synthetic Genome. Read at GEN →

How to build a virus-proof cell. Nature Podcast interview on our amino-acid-swapped genetic code work. Read at Nature Podcast →

Researchers create virus-resistant, safely restrained E. coli for medical, industrial applications. Coverage by Harvard Medical School News. Read at Harvard Medical School News →

Profile interview in Drug Discovery News on multiplexed genome engineering, virus-resistant chassis, and the path toward biocontained living therapeutics. Read at Drug Discovery News →

Coverage of our 2020 PNAS paper Improved bacterial recombineering by parallelized protein discovery. Read at Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News →

Our paper Directed evolution of multiple genomic loci allows the prediction of antibiotic resistance was selected for the PNAS “In This Issue” feature, PNAS 115(25):6315-6317. Read at PNAS →

Phys.org coverage of our DIvERGE method and its use to predict resistance evolution to antibiotics in clinical trials. Read at Phys.org →