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Adrian Woolfson

@adrianwoolfson

Opinions @WSJ.com & @Science.org. Author of Life Without Genes @harpercollins.bsky.social & On The Future of Species bloomsburybooksuk.bsky.social (12 Feb 2026) & @MITpress.bsky.social (28 April 2026). www.adrianwoolfson.com. Founder Genyro.com

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28.11.2024
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Latest posts by Adrian Woolfson @adrianwoolfson

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Genome modelling and design across all domains of life with Evo 2 - Nature Evo 2 is an artificial intelligence-based biological foundation model trained on 9 trillion DNA base pairs spanning all domains of life that predicts functional properties from genomic sequences and p...

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

05.03.2026 22:59 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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The MicrobeAtlas database: Global trends and insights into Earth’s microbial ecosystems MicrobeAtlas (www.microbeatlas.org) is an integrated, reference-based resource for truly planet-wide microbiomics, analyzing hundreds of thousands of microbial lineages across diverse environments, co...

www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

05.03.2026 22:07 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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The Accidental Architect of Globalisation: How One Man’s Thirteen-Year Odyssey Changed the World Beyond Borders: The 13-Year Journey That Bridged East and West and Forever Changed the Course of History

medium.com/time-chronic...

05.03.2026 14:03 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Too rare to be random: genetic finding suggests previously unrecognized path of mutagenesis We report a previously undescribed genotypic configuration identified in twins with HNRNPU-related neurodevelopmental disorder. Both twins have two closely spaced mosaic variants on the same allele th...

www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6...

05.03.2026 11:41 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Functional landscape of non-canonical open reading frames in coordinating cell fate The human genome harbors thousands of unannotated short open reading frames (sORFs) with the potential to encode microproteins, yet their physiologica…

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

05.03.2026 08:34 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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AI can write genomes β€” how long until it creates synthetic life? The Evo2 genomic language model can generate short genome sequences, but scientists say further advances are needed to write genomes that will work inside living cells.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

04.03.2026 20:11 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Matching sounds to shapes: Evidence of the bouba-kiki effect in naΓ―ve baby chicks Humans across multiple languages spontaneously associate the nonwords β€œkiki” and β€œbouba” with spiky and round shapes, respectively, a phenomenon named the bouba-kiki effect. To explore the origin of t...

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

04.03.2026 19:43 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Evo 2: One Year Later | Arc Institute Now published in the journal Nature, the DNA foundation model is showcasing the power of open and collaborative science

arcinstitute.org/news/evo-2-o...

04.03.2026 18:43 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Genome modelling and design across all domains of life with Evo 2 - Nature Evo 2 is an artificial intelligence-based biological foundation model trained on 9 trillion DNA base pairs spanning all domains of life that predicts functional properties from genomic sequences and p...

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

04.03.2026 18:41 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Highly mutagenic continuous evolution in E. coli using a Ξ¦29-based orthogonal replication system - Nature Biotechnology Mutational rates of bacterial evolution are increased using an error-prone orthogonal system.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

04.03.2026 09:07 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Transposable elements in the dark genome - Nature Biotechnology Transposable elements (TEs), such as retrotransposons and endogenous retroviruses, are increasingly recognized for their important roles in genome function and impact on disease development. Residing ...

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

03.03.2026 21:51 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Beyond Mendel: a call to revisit the genotype–phenotype map through new experimental paradigms Abstract. The long-standing notion that genotypes map to phenotypes through simple one gene–one trait relationships continues to shape both research in the

academic.oup.com/genetics/adv...

03.03.2026 10:11 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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A symbiotic origin of the ribosome? Abstract. The origin of life is one of the great mysteries of science. Of the multiple unsolved problems, the origin of the translation system (the means b

academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...

03.03.2026 09:34 πŸ‘ 3 πŸ” 4 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Rapid directed evolution guided by protein language models and epistatic interactions Protein engineering is limited by the inefficient search through a high-dimensional sequence space to find combinations of synergistic mutations. Traditional approaches use stepwise mutation stacking,...

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

03.03.2026 08:22 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

www.nyu.edu/about/news-p...

03.03.2026 07:04 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Good to see that On The Future of Species has been named FT Book of the Week. Thanks to Clive Cookson, Senior Science Writer at the Financial Times, for his thoughtful review.

02.03.2026 12:13 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Three-dimensional genome reorganization foreshadows zygotic genome activation in Drosophila - Nature Genetics Pico-C, a low-input Micro-C approach, reveals that dynamic three-dimensional genome folding precedes zygotic genome activation in Drosophila.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

01.03.2026 20:17 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
The Rockefeller University Β» Scientists map how aging reshapes cells across the entire mammalian body

www.rockefeller.edu/news/39031-s...

01.03.2026 19:29 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
AI and the problems of protein folding – Soft Machines, by Richard Jones

softmachines.org?p=3258

01.03.2026 17:13 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Generative AI for synthetic biology: Designing biological parts, circuits, and genomes The convergence of generative AI and synthetic biology is transforming biological design, enabling the de novo creation of biological parts and systems with predictable, programmable function. Kim et ...

www.cell.com/cell-systems...

01.03.2026 11:57 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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β€˜An AlphaFold 4’ β€” scientists marvel at DeepMind drug spin-off’s exclusive new AI Isomorphic Lab’s proprietary drug-discovery model is a major advance, but scientists developing open-source tools are left guessing how to achieve similar results.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

01.03.2026 09:49 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Foundational AI Models to Accelerate Biological Discovery Berkeley Lab is helping build AI models for autonomous research that will enable prediction and precise design of biological systems.

newscenter.lbl.gov/2026/02/02/f...

01.03.2026 09:43 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Ancient bacteria strain discovered in ice cave is resistant to some modern antibiotics | CNN In a cave in Romania, scientists found a bacterial strain entombed in ice that is resistant to 10 modern antibiotics. But it may also help fight superbugs.

www.cnn.com/2026/02/20/s...

28.02.2026 12:34 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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On the Future of Species β€” unnatural selection Geneticist and entrepreneur Adrian Woolfson argues that genome engineering and AI will let us design organisms beyond nature’s limits

Good review of β€˜On the future of species’ in today’s FT

www.google.com/url?q=https:...

28.02.2026 08:15 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Aging Is Medicine’s Biggest Blind Spot Age-related decline is not an unavoidable fate, but a problem that can be addressed with modern medicine, writes Andrew S. Brack.

time.com/7381303/agin...

27.02.2026 10:30 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Bacterial Hitchhikers Can Give Their Hosts Super Strength | Dartmouth

home.dartmouth.edu/news/2026/02...

25.02.2026 17:18 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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A nice review of On the Future of Species in today’s Nature magazine

25.02.2026 09:58 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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A petavoxel fragment of human cerebral cortex reconstructed at nanoscale resolution To fully understand how the human brain works, knowledge of its structure at high resolution is needed. Presented here is a computationally intensive reconstruction of the ultrastructure of a cubic mi...

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

25.02.2026 09:53 πŸ‘ 5 πŸ” 3 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 1
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Contaminating plasmid sequences and disrupted vector genomes in the liver following adeno-associated virus gene therapy - Nature Medicine Analyses of liver biopsies from a child with spinal muscular atrophy treated with adeno-associated virus gene therapy who developed hepatitis reveal contaminating manufacturing plasmids and disrupted ...

share.google/2O2154yLsN5c...

24.02.2026 20:54 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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De novo design of synthetic microbial genomes Nature Reviews Bioengineering - Synthetic biology might enable the bottom-up construction of synthetic genomes, offering a foundation for building synthetic cells. This Review discusses strategies...

www.nature.com/articles/s44...

24.02.2026 12:33 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0