Juan Enriquez on Genomics and Our Future

Attribution: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/juan_enriquez_on_genomics_and_our_future.html


Abstract: 
Have you ever wondered what you or your dog or your garden is made up of? Maybe you have thought about what links everyone to every living thing, let alone something that mankind hasn't even discovered yet. Or maybe you've tried to contemplate the reason why some mutations may benefit a certain nation of people. Well surely enough every living thing is made up of the exact same basic compound which you, your dog, and your garden are all coated in. It is also the same place to look when you've found mutations inside of someone. DNA is that central life-giving macromolecule through which all life is given chance, variety, and adventure. Juan Enriquez exclaims in his TED talk that delving into the matters of DNA is the most “diverse, important, and interesting” journey into life that humankind can give us.


Biography:
Juan Enriquez is well-known for his impact in economic, political, and life sciences who is continuously working on the edge of discovery with his head in the future. He is currently one of the world’s leading researcher of the uses and benefits of genomics. Currently, Enriquez is the Chairman and CEO of Biotechonomy LLC, an investment firm dedicated to life sciences research. He has written multiple articles and bestseller books on genomics and is a vey sought-after speaker. Juan advocates thoroughly that bio-science is beginning to affect our life, work, health, and wealth, so through the help of synthetic genomics, which he co-founded, he can find solutions to global issues. Graduating from Harvard with a B.A. and an MBA, with honors, led Enriquez to refer back to his school in which he was the founding director of the Harvard Business School Life Sciences Project. Joining a world discovery voyage led by Craig Venter, he and his partners discovered an unprecedented number of new species. Altogether, Juan Enriquez is widely known for his genomics insights, bestselling books on bio-science, and current advances in life sciences.
Attributions: http://www.leighbureau.com/speaker.asp?id=225 
                  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Enriquez
                  http://www.biotechonomy.com/juan.htm


Vocabulary:
Base pairs - any of the pairs of the hydrogen-bonded purine and pyrimidinebases that form the links between the sugar-phosphate backbonesof nucleic acid molecules
Genomics - the study of genomes
Genome - a full set of chromosomes; all the inheritable traits of an organism
Excrete - to separate and eliminate from an organic body; separate and expel from the blood or tissues, as waste or harmful matter
Primordial - constituting a beginning; giving origin to something derived ordeveloped; first formed
Contiguous - touching; in contact
Attribution:  http://dictionary.reference.com/


Theme
Theme 2: Evolution 
The map of ourselves, of plants, and of animals is really what is making a difference in the world, through evolution. In Juan Enriquez’s video Juan Enriquez on genomics and our future he says that the 3.2 billion base pairs that make up all living things is really a map of where you’ve been. It is through this mapping that scientists are able to create new medicines and diagnostics for diseases. Enriquez talks about evolution in the human species by noting a change in white Europeans from black Africans because the Europeans were subject to the plague by stating that those who survived had a mutation on the CCR5 receptor. Those who lived in Africa didn’t have a great deal of population pressure like the Europeans did, therefore, Africans had the same mutation and didn’t die off in mass numbers like most of the European population. Enriquez discusses the new discoveries humankind has found through the use of crystallized DNA and emphasizes just how extremely important it is that we pay attention to changes in stable things such as science and life, instead of temporal things like who the president is. All of the available technology that scientists have today is able to do great new things that we didn’t have the access to before. We can now read human’s, plant’s, and animal’s DNA sequence and even reprogram it to read something different, a completely new organism. Using that technology, scientists can insert the new sequence into a fertilized animal’s egg to produce whatever animal we chose to program. It is through this technological advancement and change over periods of time that we have diversity of life on Earth.
Theme 8: Science, Technology, and Society
One of the biggest adventures that science has taken us on led to the discovery of the human genome. This innovation has led to advancements in technology and science through the curiosity of individuals behind a microscope. Juan Enriquez mentions scientist Cliff Tabin who has utilized advanced technology to reprogram chicken embryos to grow more wings. This is just one of the many directions that technology can lead us and with more and more knowledge becoming available through advancements, works like Tabin’s can be used on human cells. In other words, as long as scientists continue stem cell research as well as genomic research we will be able to reprogram cells to express different body functions which means we will have the technology to reproduce body parts in such a fashion that our generation and our kids’ generation could be walking on reproduced limbs. The human genome, even though so colossal, differs very slightly from your neighbor but it is through these small, distinct variable changes that each and every person is his or her own individual being. The mapping out of a person’s DNA sequence can now be shared with the public, made up of only four letters: A, T, C, G. your sequence can, in fact, be decoded and read to you on a CD for a costly price but many people question this idea of literally knowing everything about yourself and believe that technology is intruding on the last thing that is actually personal to us. Others see this technology as a positive development that has led to the incredible ability to decode and understand how everything reads out inside our body. However you look at it, technology will never cease to advance and new discoveries will always have scientists thirsty for more.