5. Dreaming in Biology: Tales from the Ginkgo Bioworks Studio

Cas Smith is the Director of Creative Marketing at Ginkgo Bioworks. He helps to make synthetic biology accessible to more people in a variety of industries. On this episode, Cas shares with Erum and Karl how synthetic biology is already making an impact on our world and also how Ginkgo plans to expand that footprint by informing and engaging other industries like pharmaceuticals and government. Cas also covers different ways that synthetic biology can help various sectors as well as what problem he’d tackle first if he was starting a synthetic biology startup. In this episode you’ll learn 00:00 - Introduction 00:58 - The background and history of Ginkgo 03:45 - What “Grow Everything” means to Cas Smith 04:48 - Helping everyday people understand the power of synthetic biology 07:49 - Relating synthetic biology to the pharmaceutical industry 11:17 - The challenges Ginkgo faces communicating to a broad audience. 13:03 - The types of companies that synthetic biology can benefit 16:50 - How self-programming uses genes to produce specific proteins, enzymes, or molecules 18:25 - How biobricks are used to assemble larger “circuits” that perform a specific function 19:17 - The different teams and functions within Ginkgo 23:39 - Why Cas is excited about exposing new people to the potential of synthetic biology 28:57 - The reason young people and kids are important to the adoption and evolution of synthetic biology 31:50 - The different companies that Ginkgo supports Episode Links: Press - Ginkgo Bioworks Sumitomo Corporation Bolt Threads Aldevron: Call or Text the Grow Everything Hotline:  +1 804-505-5553 Have a question or comment? Message us here: Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / LinkedIn / Youtube / GrowEverything website Email: [email protected] Support here: Patreon Topics: bioeconomy, biomanufacturing, Biotechnology, synthetic biology, entrepreneurship, biotech platform, platform technology, biotech ideas, creative communication, marketing, science education, science communication, New York Biotech, New Bio City, Genspace