The Code Breaker

Books

The Code Breaker

After doing the early work in crispr, doudna seriously considered leaving for medical school or business school — to do more applied work instead of just basic science

The patent they filed was controversial — it’s a process that occurs in nature and people who had worked in the field were quite upset

Worked with Genentech— but the company failed soon afterwards. Doudna didn’t enjoy working at Genentech either

Realised she had to transition from player (researcher) to coach (team leader)

Place as much emphasis on when someone is a good fit, instead of just raw talent

Don’t just publish your work. Explicitly talk about why your work is new and interesting

Started her own startup afterwards. Raised a friends and family round at the start instead of raising venture money — caribou biosciences. This has its ipo in July 2021

Grants helped keep the company alive when vc money wasn’t interested — both from government and from foundations like Bill Gates Foundation

When crispr was being developed, they didn’t know it would become a gene editing tool. That discovery was led by two post docs collaborating between Berkeley and Vienna and mentored by doudna and another researcher

A lot of patent wars developed after doudna’s papers

It takes a tribe. Get other people to work with you and for you

— if you have been working on something for a while, you can see great potential in something even when those who are working on it cannot (doudna as a mentor to her research assistants)

Know when to be pushy to get what you want. Know when to push back against gatekeepers

Tried to get all the too crispr researchers in a consortium to work with vcs and start a company — but this didn’t work out in the end. There were 4 companies that were created from “splinter groups” of these consortiums. This led to a lot of patent wars and difficulties in licensing the technology to others

Loads of backstabbing by vcs, “business collaborators”, and other players. Others got the patent before they did by misleading doudna

Doudna was physically ill from the stress of these “collaborations”. She quit and told others that she didn’t care about her stock

Worked with her original cofounder Horowitz again for a new company

Loads of controversy and politicking about patents and credit later

Crispr can already be used to edit cells that are first taken out of one’s body, and the reinserted again. This can be used to treat sickle cell anemia, for example