Customers: Researchers and those they communicate with. Specifically those doing early development of novel proteins - antibodies, biologics, CARs, CRISPR, enzymes, bio-materials, bio-sensors, optogenetics, or basic research. We help them organize and intelligently manage their libraries of constructs based on the constructs' capabilities.
Problem: Communicating genetic designs to yourself, to others in your field, to others in your company - your boss or your technicians, to manufacturers and suppliers. And communicate without error, with higher-level abstraction, and with functional rather than technical detail. High-throughput design and analysis of designs naturally falls out of those capabilities.
DNA is the 'blueprint' for the "protein" machines. If you want to build a new or novel biological machine, you must construct a DNA blueprint for it, that blueprint is ingested, and the machine is built to spec. Our software is essentially a 1-dimensional CAD program that lets you focus on, manipulate and organize the material properties of the biological nanomachines you are building, rather than focus on the manufacturing process. Think the difference between producing a high-level CAD file vs G-code for the design of a sub-10nm 3d object.
Historically, you have to build the blueprint by hand. The challenges of building the DNA blueprint itself were immense, and have slowly become more and more routine. Simply obtaining a close-enough blueprint to what you wanted was sufficient to develop synthetic insulin, synthetic HGH and a host of other billion-dollar biologic therapies you see on TV commercials every night. This tool is a break-point - it allows you to build biological machines based on what you want the machine to do, and leave the construction of the blue-print itself entirely behind the scenes. It compiles down the high-level design into a synthesizable blueprint without the user needing to intervene. Construction of DNA is fraught with all sorts of syntax rules that this helps to entirely obviate. With this software a researcher can focus on the properties of their desired product 'fluoresces green', 'binds to Gold', 'more soluble' rather than nuanced genetic construction rules.
Many useful protein machines can be deconstructed into component parts (each part itself encoded by DNA). Pinecone lets you drag and drop those component parts together, press buy, and get shipped the DNA that encodes those parts. Historically you'd have to parse a string of thousands of A, T, G and Cs (literally in Excel or Word) - where a single error would result in failure of the machine.
These proteins are useful therapeutically, economically, and socially - they are biology's nanotechnology. They are a few orders of magnitude more precise than Intel's new i9 processor's features, are 3D in nature, and work in wet, room-temperature environments.
DNA needs to be compiled into a protein in order to 'do' anything. DNA is the source code, proteins are the molecular machines built by the code. And every organism uses a similar compiler. So the DNA has to be put inside an organism before the DNA source code can be 'compiled' into a biological machine (a protein). Interestingly at the level of the compiler, almost every organism on Earth is capable of compiling most others' particular DNA into a protein (with a lot of exceptions).
Most purchased DNA that encodes a protein comes in the form of a bacterial 'virus' called a plasmid that can very easily be given to e coli - and it makes billions of copies of that DNA with very high fidelity in a few hours (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasmid). This DNA can then be purified from that e coli in physically appreciable amounts and then be put into other organisms for ultimate usage. If you're purifying a chemical or a therapeutic the DNA is often put into yeast or e coli. If you're doing research, there are a number of 'model organisms' the DNA can be put into to supplement the genes already in the organism you're studying - including human cancer cells.
There are certain kinds of 'gene therapies' where the DNA is actually put into living human cells, often that have been harvested, and then put back into the person. This enables the genetic code for the new tools/proteins to be incorporated as a therapy.
The physical insertion of DNA into an organism is called "Transfection"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transfection (or transduction, or transformation for various particulars).
Wonderful, thanks so much for the explanation. I think I knew that you had to get the DNA into an organism, but I had no idea how that could be done. The fact that the purchased DNA comes in the form of a virus that's ready to make lots more of that DNA is amazing.
Problem: Communicating genetic designs to yourself, to others in your field, to others in your company - your boss or your technicians, to manufacturers and suppliers. And communicate without error, with higher-level abstraction, and with functional rather than technical detail. High-throughput design and analysis of designs naturally falls out of those capabilities.
DNA is the 'blueprint' for the "protein" machines. If you want to build a new or novel biological machine, you must construct a DNA blueprint for it, that blueprint is ingested, and the machine is built to spec. Our software is essentially a 1-dimensional CAD program that lets you focus on, manipulate and organize the material properties of the biological nanomachines you are building, rather than focus on the manufacturing process. Think the difference between producing a high-level CAD file vs G-code for the design of a sub-10nm 3d object.
Historically, you have to build the blueprint by hand. The challenges of building the DNA blueprint itself were immense, and have slowly become more and more routine. Simply obtaining a close-enough blueprint to what you wanted was sufficient to develop synthetic insulin, synthetic HGH and a host of other billion-dollar biologic therapies you see on TV commercials every night. This tool is a break-point - it allows you to build biological machines based on what you want the machine to do, and leave the construction of the blue-print itself entirely behind the scenes. It compiles down the high-level design into a synthesizable blueprint without the user needing to intervene. Construction of DNA is fraught with all sorts of syntax rules that this helps to entirely obviate. With this software a researcher can focus on the properties of their desired product 'fluoresces green', 'binds to Gold', 'more soluble' rather than nuanced genetic construction rules.
Many useful protein machines can be deconstructed into component parts (each part itself encoded by DNA). Pinecone lets you drag and drop those component parts together, press buy, and get shipped the DNA that encodes those parts. Historically you'd have to parse a string of thousands of A, T, G and Cs (literally in Excel or Word) - where a single error would result in failure of the machine.
These proteins are useful therapeutically, economically, and socially - they are biology's nanotechnology. They are a few orders of magnitude more precise than Intel's new i9 processor's features, are 3D in nature, and work in wet, room-temperature environments.