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The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race
Goodreads Choice Award
Nominee for Readers' Favorite History & Biography (2021)When Jennifer Doudna was in sixth grade, she came home one day to find that her dad had left a paperback titled The Double Helix on her bed. As she sped through the pages, she became enthralled by the intense drama behind the competition to discover the code of life. Even though her high school counselor told her girls didn’t become scientists, she decided she would.
Driven by a passion to understand how nature works and to turn discoveries into inventions, she would help to make what the book’s author, James Watson, told her was the most important biological advance since his co-discovery of the structure of DNA. She and her collaborators turned a curiosity of nature into an invention that will transform the human race: an easy-to-use tool that can edit DNA. Known as CRISPR, it opened a brave new world of medical miracles and moral questions.
The development of CRISPR and the race to create vaccines for coronavirus will hasten our transition to the next great innovation revolution. The past half-century has been a digital age, based on the microchip, computer, and internet. Now we are entering a life-science revolution. Children who study digital coding will be joined by those who study genetic code.
Should we use our new evolution-hacking powers to make us less susceptible to viruses? What a wonderful boon that would be! And what about preventing depression? Hmmm…Should we allow parents, if they can afford it, to enhance the height or muscles or IQ of their kids?
After helping to discover CRISPR, Doudna became a leader in wrestling with these moral issues and, with her collaborator Emmanuelle Charpentier, won the Nobel Prize in 2020.
Driven by a passion to understand how nature works and to turn discoveries into inventions, she would help to make what the book’s author, James Watson, told her was the most important biological advance since his co-discovery of the structure of DNA. She and her collaborators turned a curiosity of nature into an invention that will transform the human race: an easy-to-use tool that can edit DNA. Known as CRISPR, it opened a brave new world of medical miracles and moral questions.
The development of CRISPR and the race to create vaccines for coronavirus will hasten our transition to the next great innovation revolution. The past half-century has been a digital age, based on the microchip, computer, and internet. Now we are entering a life-science revolution. Children who study digital coding will be joined by those who study genetic code.
Should we use our new evolution-hacking powers to make us less susceptible to viruses? What a wonderful boon that would be! And what about preventing depression? Hmmm…Should we allow parents, if they can afford it, to enhance the height or muscles or IQ of their kids?
After helping to discover CRISPR, Doudna became a leader in wrestling with these moral issues and, with her collaborator Emmanuelle Charpentier, won the Nobel Prize in 2020.
536 pages, Hardcover
First published March 9, 2021
11662 people are currently reading
86490 people want to read
About the author
Walter Isaacson
126 books21.8k followersWalter Isaacson, a professor of history at Tulane, has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair of CNN, and editor of Time. He is the author of 'Leonardo da Vinci; The Innovators; Steve Jobs; Einstein: His Life and Universe; Benjamin Franklin: An American Life; and Kissinger: A Biography, and the coauthor of The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made. Visit him at Isaacson.Tulane.edu and on Twitter at @WalterIsaacson
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 4,792 reviews
March 21, 2022
The CRISPR gene editing system is one of the coolest and perhaps most consequential scientific breakthroughs of the last decade. I’m familiar with it because of my work at the foundation—we’re funding a number of projects that use the technology—but I still learned a lot from this comprehensive and accessible book about its discovery by Nobel Prize-winning biochemist Jennifer Doudna and her colleagues. Isaacson does a good job highlighting the most important ethical questions around gene editing.
March 1, 2021
3.5 stars
Until 2020, only five women, beginning with Marie Curie in 1911, had won a Nobel for chemistry. But 2020 was the year it went to two women, Jennifer Doudna and French colleague Emmanuelle Charpentier, for the development of CRISPR, a gene editing technology.
Isaacson hones in on Doudna and Charpentier, but he also highlights others in the scientific community whose work led the way and contributed to this new discovery. Some of the more interesting chapters deals with biohackers, rivalries, patents, and the personality quirks of the major players, as well as the use of the current technology and it’s ethical implications.
With the interesting bits, there was a very heavy emphasis on the science. Too heavy in my opinion. I have a degree in science and still found myself skimming through some of the more dense material. I fear that due to this unfortunate tendency of the author’s, this book will hold limited appeal. In addition, there’s a lot of repetition with the same information and stories told over and over. Finally, the author tends to insert himself into the narrative too much, adding little value.
For the above reasons I would recommend this book only with reservations. I’m glad I read it, but I think it would be an even more powerful book had it been condensed and edited.
But onto more of the good….
With the Covid-19 pandemic, the significance of CRISPR is more vital than ever. This is the technology that was used to develop Covid tests and more importantly, the Covid vaccine, which was developed so quickly because the groundwork for it was already in place after decades of research. Instead of the usual competition and closely guarded work, there was global cooperation. It was encouraging to see rivalries set aside in the midst of a global health crisis.
Along with the usefulness of this technology in fighting Covid, these scientific advances comes ethical questions. Few would argue developing the use of gene editing to treat or prevent diseases such as cancer, sickle cell anemia, Tay-Sachs, Huntington’s chorea, cystic fibrosis, and mental illness. But where do we draw the line and who gets to choose where that line is? Should parents be able to choose the gender, skin color, height, and intelligence, along with other ‘desirable” traits of their children? Would we eliminate the diversity and traits that have led to the genius of Einstein, Mozart, Isaac Newton, Michelangelo, Steve Jobs, Tolstoy? We aren’t there quite yet, but there’s already differences of opinion. These are the questions that future generations will have to answer and consider the implications.
This book highlights the importance of scientific inquiry, research, and the practical real-world use of these advances. No one could have predicted how the world would be impacted in 2020/21 from the discoveries of DNA, mRNA, and CRISPr. Science has always been a collaboration that endures through the ages, from Darwin and Mendel to Watson and Crick to Doudna and Charpentier.
“At the end of the day, the discoveries are what endure,” Charpentier says. “We are just passing on this planet for a short time. We do our job, and then we leave and others pick up the work.”
I hope this book will inspire and encourage more young women to go into the sciences, specifically research.
3.5 stars: 5+ stars for the science community, including Doudna and Charpentier. 2 stars for the extraneous information in telling the story.
• This was a buddy read with my friend Marialyce, and while we both had reservations with the way the story was told, it inspired many thoughtful discussions.
• I received a digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Publication date is March 9, 2021 by Simon & Schuster
Until 2020, only five women, beginning with Marie Curie in 1911, had won a Nobel for chemistry. But 2020 was the year it went to two women, Jennifer Doudna and French colleague Emmanuelle Charpentier, for the development of CRISPR, a gene editing technology.
Isaacson hones in on Doudna and Charpentier, but he also highlights others in the scientific community whose work led the way and contributed to this new discovery. Some of the more interesting chapters deals with biohackers, rivalries, patents, and the personality quirks of the major players, as well as the use of the current technology and it’s ethical implications.
With the interesting bits, there was a very heavy emphasis on the science. Too heavy in my opinion. I have a degree in science and still found myself skimming through some of the more dense material. I fear that due to this unfortunate tendency of the author’s, this book will hold limited appeal. In addition, there’s a lot of repetition with the same information and stories told over and over. Finally, the author tends to insert himself into the narrative too much, adding little value.
For the above reasons I would recommend this book only with reservations. I’m glad I read it, but I think it would be an even more powerful book had it been condensed and edited.
But onto more of the good….
With the Covid-19 pandemic, the significance of CRISPR is more vital than ever. This is the technology that was used to develop Covid tests and more importantly, the Covid vaccine, which was developed so quickly because the groundwork for it was already in place after decades of research. Instead of the usual competition and closely guarded work, there was global cooperation. It was encouraging to see rivalries set aside in the midst of a global health crisis.
Along with the usefulness of this technology in fighting Covid, these scientific advances comes ethical questions. Few would argue developing the use of gene editing to treat or prevent diseases such as cancer, sickle cell anemia, Tay-Sachs, Huntington’s chorea, cystic fibrosis, and mental illness. But where do we draw the line and who gets to choose where that line is? Should parents be able to choose the gender, skin color, height, and intelligence, along with other ‘desirable” traits of their children? Would we eliminate the diversity and traits that have led to the genius of Einstein, Mozart, Isaac Newton, Michelangelo, Steve Jobs, Tolstoy? We aren’t there quite yet, but there’s already differences of opinion. These are the questions that future generations will have to answer and consider the implications.
This book highlights the importance of scientific inquiry, research, and the practical real-world use of these advances. No one could have predicted how the world would be impacted in 2020/21 from the discoveries of DNA, mRNA, and CRISPr. Science has always been a collaboration that endures through the ages, from Darwin and Mendel to Watson and Crick to Doudna and Charpentier.
“At the end of the day, the discoveries are what endure,” Charpentier says. “We are just passing on this planet for a short time. We do our job, and then we leave and others pick up the work.”
I hope this book will inspire and encourage more young women to go into the sciences, specifically research.
3.5 stars: 5+ stars for the science community, including Doudna and Charpentier. 2 stars for the extraneous information in telling the story.
• This was a buddy read with my friend Marialyce, and while we both had reservations with the way the story was told, it inspired many thoughtful discussions.
• I received a digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Publication date is March 9, 2021 by Simon & Schuster
April 15, 2021
I've taken it from five stars to four after mulling the book and having written the review, I realize I only want to give it three. This is a good book but too wide in scope. It's not a biography of Jennifer Doudna, although there is a focus on her.
For those who think the covid-19 was discovered with amazing rapidity, that's not true. Doudna and Charpentier (actually Charpentier made the key discovery but this book has some bias in favor of American scientists) discovered their particular CRISPR technique -- cutting and pasting code into mRNA using enzymes and based on how bacteria fight viruses -- using a specific enzyme in 2011. Decades of research by dozens of scientists laid the foundation, which is always true in science and not emphasized often enough in science books. Isaacson does this -- and much more, to the detriment of the book. They were awarded the Nobel Prize in 2020 because their discovery, apparently more than others, led to the precise covid vaccines we're getting or will get now. There are others who believe they deserve credit and maybe that Nobel ought to be theirs.
Isaacson, who I've never read before but has written some acclaimed biographies, takes on an amorphous, complex scientific subject trying to cover many different aspects, and I don't think he ever really gets his arms around it. It reads like a cohesive narrative but that depends on leaving out a lot and jumping around among people, science and other topics. While reading it, it seemed more coherent to me than after I finished. The excess of information on the chemistry, the many scientists, the patents, biotech info, biohackers, germline editing and ethics, among other topics in there, could each fill a book. So The Code Breakers, while interesting reading, is often either too specific or too broad, with too many tangents.
The science: Chemistry is possibly my worst subject. He explains it well because I understood a lot of it while I was reading, which is to his credit. But, and it could be how my brain is wired, I don't remember most of it now nor do I need to. He didn't need to get into that sort of detail, he wasn't writing a science textbook. Now that I'm familiar with the technology I'm seeing articles with great frequency and the basic background is helpful for some.
The scientists: There are so many in here because so many have contributed and the book is out of date in some areas already. It's a very fast-growing area of study. It all started with Watson and Crick's discovery of the double helix of DNA in 1953. Along the way hundreds of scientists, possibly more, have contributed. That's how science works: small discoveries build upon and advance others and no one person is ever solely responsible. Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier's work was key -- but many others contributed along the way and are still.
There is a a focus on the personalities of some of the scientists, in the case of Watson on his misogyny, his failure to give credit to a female scientist without whom Watson and Crick could not have put the puzzle together, his personal views which are abhorrent but were for me yet another side trip in the book. There's a lot on competition, falling-outs, possible theft of intellectual property even though by agreement once patented, pre-publication a lot of the science, which is advancing very quickly, is open sourced. There's a parade of names and labs and biotech companies and they matter, but sometimes reading it felt like reading The Encyclopedia of Gene Editing, something I would never reach for.
Also there are quality color photos of a number of scientists, too many for my taste -- sometimes by the time I saw the photo I couldn't remember among the parade of names, discoveries, personality traits and rivalries exactly how that person fit in. I'd rather not have had so many photos, including multiples of Doudna, and have the book be shorter, tighter, minus the photos and so less spendy.
There are the patent races and the competition among universities in the U.S. and he covers some abroad. Biotech companies are now and have been, in this area of research aligned with the scientists and their universities so for years there's been a race for the scientists to publish and patent because their schools (in Doudna's case, Berkeley, but mainly in the U.S. Harvard and MIT) benefit and the biotech companies the scientists form (Doudna, like most of the scientists in here, owns several) have gone on to make many millions. There's big money at stake.
The ethics: Another detailed, serious, important topic which is not the focus. This is a core issue that could fill a book and maybe there are several and each one will probably be outdated as soon as its published. Because besides ethical nightmares and gentlemen- and gentlewomen's agreements not to cross certain lines, those lines have been and are being crossed. There are biohackers taking this open source technology and doing things with it such as one who experimented and altered traits of a frog. There are scientists with capabilities to do things that others don't approve of.
It's complicated and because he doesn't focus on that one topic which is changing all the time anyway, it's confusing and to me, frightening. One scientist in China went beyond the unofficial agreements, editing the genes of twins to eliminate a certain virus. He didn't need to do that; an easy method that doesn't involve germline editing is available. But he did and one twin came out fine but Isaacson tells us it didn't go well with the other -- but not why. That scientist is in prison in China now. In another experiment, one conducted in the U.S., one of the trial subjects died.
There is the ability now to both cure many diseases by various means of RNA and DNA editing, and to ensure they're not passed on to future generations -- and to use that same technology soon (or now) to have parents choose eye and hair color. Not far behind or here already are height, weight, IQ. There's a specific sequence for athleticism found in many marathon runners so parents may want faster, stronger -- whatever. Again this could and should be its own book, and may be. These are enormous questions. Ban germline editing, which is what it's called, in one country and the wealthy will go elsewhere to create designer children. This is obviously very troubling. Also, even a cure can have negative consequences. Now. And who knows what happens later when humans have been messing with genes for a long time? Isaacson writes about a woman who was cured of her sickle cell. But editing that gene is problematic because the same sickle cell makes people more resistant to malaria.
It's all so complex. And his broad approach made for compelling reading while I was reading it but having finished most of it didn't stick with me and I think partly it's because of how much he throws in. The science, a lot of it is minutiae and covering the scientists, the labs, the competition, the biotech companies, the patents, the prizes, the open sourcing, the biohackers, the uses and abuses, the personal traits of Watson and some others -- it's ironic because this technology depends on very specific sequences being worked out and inserted very carefully by very specific methods into very specific cells. But this book about it is both too specific and too broad and, because the science is moving very quickly in many directions, in places outdated already. The more I think about it (two stars off more) I wouldn't choose to read it if I had a do-over.
For those who think the covid-19 was discovered with amazing rapidity, that's not true. Doudna and Charpentier (actually Charpentier made the key discovery but this book has some bias in favor of American scientists) discovered their particular CRISPR technique -- cutting and pasting code into mRNA using enzymes and based on how bacteria fight viruses -- using a specific enzyme in 2011. Decades of research by dozens of scientists laid the foundation, which is always true in science and not emphasized often enough in science books. Isaacson does this -- and much more, to the detriment of the book. They were awarded the Nobel Prize in 2020 because their discovery, apparently more than others, led to the precise covid vaccines we're getting or will get now. There are others who believe they deserve credit and maybe that Nobel ought to be theirs.
Isaacson, who I've never read before but has written some acclaimed biographies, takes on an amorphous, complex scientific subject trying to cover many different aspects, and I don't think he ever really gets his arms around it. It reads like a cohesive narrative but that depends on leaving out a lot and jumping around among people, science and other topics. While reading it, it seemed more coherent to me than after I finished. The excess of information on the chemistry, the many scientists, the patents, biotech info, biohackers, germline editing and ethics, among other topics in there, could each fill a book. So The Code Breakers, while interesting reading, is often either too specific or too broad, with too many tangents.
The science: Chemistry is possibly my worst subject. He explains it well because I understood a lot of it while I was reading, which is to his credit. But, and it could be how my brain is wired, I don't remember most of it now nor do I need to. He didn't need to get into that sort of detail, he wasn't writing a science textbook. Now that I'm familiar with the technology I'm seeing articles with great frequency and the basic background is helpful for some.
The scientists: There are so many in here because so many have contributed and the book is out of date in some areas already. It's a very fast-growing area of study. It all started with Watson and Crick's discovery of the double helix of DNA in 1953. Along the way hundreds of scientists, possibly more, have contributed. That's how science works: small discoveries build upon and advance others and no one person is ever solely responsible. Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier's work was key -- but many others contributed along the way and are still.
There is a a focus on the personalities of some of the scientists, in the case of Watson on his misogyny, his failure to give credit to a female scientist without whom Watson and Crick could not have put the puzzle together, his personal views which are abhorrent but were for me yet another side trip in the book. There's a lot on competition, falling-outs, possible theft of intellectual property even though by agreement once patented, pre-publication a lot of the science, which is advancing very quickly, is open sourced. There's a parade of names and labs and biotech companies and they matter, but sometimes reading it felt like reading The Encyclopedia of Gene Editing, something I would never reach for.
Also there are quality color photos of a number of scientists, too many for my taste -- sometimes by the time I saw the photo I couldn't remember among the parade of names, discoveries, personality traits and rivalries exactly how that person fit in. I'd rather not have had so many photos, including multiples of Doudna, and have the book be shorter, tighter, minus the photos and so less spendy.
There are the patent races and the competition among universities in the U.S. and he covers some abroad. Biotech companies are now and have been, in this area of research aligned with the scientists and their universities so for years there's been a race for the scientists to publish and patent because their schools (in Doudna's case, Berkeley, but mainly in the U.S. Harvard and MIT) benefit and the biotech companies the scientists form (Doudna, like most of the scientists in here, owns several) have gone on to make many millions. There's big money at stake.
The ethics: Another detailed, serious, important topic which is not the focus. This is a core issue that could fill a book and maybe there are several and each one will probably be outdated as soon as its published. Because besides ethical nightmares and gentlemen- and gentlewomen's agreements not to cross certain lines, those lines have been and are being crossed. There are biohackers taking this open source technology and doing things with it such as one who experimented and altered traits of a frog. There are scientists with capabilities to do things that others don't approve of.
It's complicated and because he doesn't focus on that one topic which is changing all the time anyway, it's confusing and to me, frightening. One scientist in China went beyond the unofficial agreements, editing the genes of twins to eliminate a certain virus. He didn't need to do that; an easy method that doesn't involve germline editing is available. But he did and one twin came out fine but Isaacson tells us it didn't go well with the other -- but not why. That scientist is in prison in China now. In another experiment, one conducted in the U.S., one of the trial subjects died.
There is the ability now to both cure many diseases by various means of RNA and DNA editing, and to ensure they're not passed on to future generations -- and to use that same technology soon (or now) to have parents choose eye and hair color. Not far behind or here already are height, weight, IQ. There's a specific sequence for athleticism found in many marathon runners so parents may want faster, stronger -- whatever. Again this could and should be its own book, and may be. These are enormous questions. Ban germline editing, which is what it's called, in one country and the wealthy will go elsewhere to create designer children. This is obviously very troubling. Also, even a cure can have negative consequences. Now. And who knows what happens later when humans have been messing with genes for a long time? Isaacson writes about a woman who was cured of her sickle cell. But editing that gene is problematic because the same sickle cell makes people more resistant to malaria.
It's all so complex. And his broad approach made for compelling reading while I was reading it but having finished most of it didn't stick with me and I think partly it's because of how much he throws in. The science, a lot of it is minutiae and covering the scientists, the labs, the competition, the biotech companies, the patents, the prizes, the open sourcing, the biohackers, the uses and abuses, the personal traits of Watson and some others -- it's ironic because this technology depends on very specific sequences being worked out and inserted very carefully by very specific methods into very specific cells. But this book about it is both too specific and too broad and, because the science is moving very quickly in many directions, in places outdated already. The more I think about it (two stars off more) I wouldn't choose to read it if I had a do-over.
March 1, 2021
I have loved all the three books that I was fortunate enough to read by Walter Issacson from Einstein, The Innovators, to Steve Job, this author was able to enthrall me with the main topics he chose to share and write of. However, sad to say, his new book on Jennifer Doudna entitled The Code Breaker really left me feeling disappointed and let down. Wondering why this was, I will preface this that there was a huge amount of science, very technical science which did bog down the story. Now, I do realize the importance of this science particularly as we are combating a pandemic, but at times I felt the author tried to immerse himself inferring how smart he was to truly understand and compete with these scientists and researchers. I certainly am not saying that Issacson is not a brilliant man, but his repetition of sections of the tale often made for that horrid sense of boredom to set in.
The other thing that annoyed me by the end was that I knew nothing about Dr Doudna, a winner with her former coworker of the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 2020. Her finding of the CRISPR-Cas9 , along with its cofounder, Emmanuelle Marie Charpentier, opened up brand-new avenues that science can readily travel into a "brave" new world, one where genetically modified DNA was shown and where both the biology, chemistry, engineering, and ethics come into play. I learned much about the science and Jennifer's education, but little of the women. I wanted to be let in on her home life. How did he balance all she did, the research, the traveling, the supervision of many with the demands of being a wife and a mother? We got a brief look into her formative years but I wanted more. How did she relate to her siblings and what exactly was her relationship with her father? (it was hinted at that there were some issues there) In reality, I was looking for the personal to be the main thrust of the book.
It's a long story, where a plethora of scientists, doctoral students, post-doctoral candidates, engineers and so forth are presented and it's not that I think these men and women do not deserve their moments, but it tended to cloudy up the telling.
In all, it takes commitment to read this book and I have a feeling that its reception will not be the one that this author has received previously in his wonderful works. Sad to say, this is not something I would heartily recommend and one I would caution the reader to be ready to be at times overwhelmed and needing a pause in its reading.
Thank you to NetGalley for a copy of this book due out March 9, 2021
Jan and I took on this massive book about Jennifer Doudna, and while we were very interested in some of the story, there were parts that seemed overloaded and repetitive. Without her science background, I would have been lost in some of the detail, but thankfully Jan was able to fill in the gaps. This book will attract people who are interested in science and those who were very interested in discovering the science behind the vaccine for today's pandemic, Covid, possibly eliminating this disease and providing hope for the future through gene editing. It is definitely a brave new world being thrust upon us and the challenges will be many.
Once again thanks to my dear friend, Jan, for without her guidance, I would have been left not knowing as much about this important and fascinating work. As Jan has mentioned, there are not enough stars for the work and dedication of the science community making such discoveries and moving mankind forward.
The other thing that annoyed me by the end was that I knew nothing about Dr Doudna, a winner with her former coworker of the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 2020. Her finding of the CRISPR-Cas9 , along with its cofounder, Emmanuelle Marie Charpentier, opened up brand-new avenues that science can readily travel into a "brave" new world, one where genetically modified DNA was shown and where both the biology, chemistry, engineering, and ethics come into play. I learned much about the science and Jennifer's education, but little of the women. I wanted to be let in on her home life. How did he balance all she did, the research, the traveling, the supervision of many with the demands of being a wife and a mother? We got a brief look into her formative years but I wanted more. How did she relate to her siblings and what exactly was her relationship with her father? (it was hinted at that there were some issues there) In reality, I was looking for the personal to be the main thrust of the book.
It's a long story, where a plethora of scientists, doctoral students, post-doctoral candidates, engineers and so forth are presented and it's not that I think these men and women do not deserve their moments, but it tended to cloudy up the telling.
In all, it takes commitment to read this book and I have a feeling that its reception will not be the one that this author has received previously in his wonderful works. Sad to say, this is not something I would heartily recommend and one I would caution the reader to be ready to be at times overwhelmed and needing a pause in its reading.
Thank you to NetGalley for a copy of this book due out March 9, 2021
Jan and I took on this massive book about Jennifer Doudna, and while we were very interested in some of the story, there were parts that seemed overloaded and repetitive. Without her science background, I would have been lost in some of the detail, but thankfully Jan was able to fill in the gaps. This book will attract people who are interested in science and those who were very interested in discovering the science behind the vaccine for today's pandemic, Covid, possibly eliminating this disease and providing hope for the future through gene editing. It is definitely a brave new world being thrust upon us and the challenges will be many.
Once again thanks to my dear friend, Jan, for without her guidance, I would have been left not knowing as much about this important and fascinating work. As Jan has mentioned, there are not enough stars for the work and dedication of the science community making such discoveries and moving mankind forward.
May 10, 2021
Isaacson may be brilliant at writing biographies (I've never read any of them), but this book is neither a comprehensive biography of Jennifer Doudna (or any of the other scientists involved), nor is it a decent science book that explains the science of the CRISPR (a gene editing tool) mechanism in any detail. This is rather an all over the place, long-winded, and choppy mish-mash of vague biography with history and a bit of science, starting with the discovery of DNA by James Watson and proceeding through the decades with all the smaller discoveries that led to CRISPR gene editing and it's uses, not to mention the confusing legal wrangles and ethics - all of it interspersed with the authors unwanted opinions! The author does manage to show that science is generally collaborative and great discoveries are based on other discoveries, but this book has too much fluff and not enough substance.
A much better and more streamlined book is Editing Humanity by Kevin Davies.
NOTE: This book was published in March 2021 and is already outdated - CRISPR science moves that fast. Next best thing as of this review is CRISPRoff.
August 2, 2024
I read Walter Isaacson's book, Steve Jobs and rated it five stars. I have most of Isaacson's other books on my TBR. I admire him as an author and researcher.
The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race interested me for many reasons. Nonfiction, specifically biography, autobiography, and memoir are my favorite genre. I am highly interested in science, and I've read 10+ books about COVID and about extending longevity through innovations in science, medicine, and health.
I listened to this book on audiobook. It captivated me early on but then seemed to drag throughout the middle.
The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race interested me for many reasons. Nonfiction, specifically biography, autobiography, and memoir are my favorite genre. I am highly interested in science, and I've read 10+ books about COVID and about extending longevity through innovations in science, medicine, and health.
I listened to this book on audiobook. It captivated me early on but then seemed to drag throughout the middle.
September 2, 2021
CRISPR(Jennifer Doudna et al. 🤩) + Walter Isaacson => AWESOMENESS!!
It was good! Very good indeed.
Title is a bit misleading. It is not a full biography of Jennifer Doudna alone. Rather, it’s a biography of CRISPR technology and a detailed story of how it was discovered from fascinating and complicated collaborations between numerous great scientists. The story of CRISPR is not done yet.
The research is still ongoing and very much alive. This technology is promising us A Brave New World of genetic editing. It’s both captivating and terrifying for its multifaceted possibilities.
#Key figures in CRISPR and Genome editing
- Jennifer Doudna - $NTLA (Intellia Therapeutics), $CRBU (Caribou Biosciences), Mammoth Biosciences
- Emmanuelle Charpentier - $CRSP (CRISPR Therapeutics)
- Feng Zhang - $EDIT (Editas Medicine), Sherlock Biosciences
- George Church -a very interesting character
- Martin Jinek
- Philippe Horvath
- Rodolphe Barrangou
- He Jiankui - First reported case of germline edited twin babies
- Jillian Banfield
- Rosalind Franklin - Photo 51 - A
- James Watson - A complicated hero of DNA
- Gregor Mendel - The legend
- And many more
#Books and other resources mentioned in the book
- Gattaca (1997)
- Brave New World
- The Double Helix
- Human Nature ( A Documentary from Netflix)
...
It was good! Very good indeed.
Title is a bit misleading. It is not a full biography of Jennifer Doudna alone. Rather, it’s a biography of CRISPR technology and a detailed story of how it was discovered from fascinating and complicated collaborations between numerous great scientists. The story of CRISPR is not done yet.
The research is still ongoing and very much alive. This technology is promising us A Brave New World of genetic editing. It’s both captivating and terrifying for its multifaceted possibilities.
#Key figures in CRISPR and Genome editing
- Jennifer Doudna - $NTLA (Intellia Therapeutics), $CRBU (Caribou Biosciences), Mammoth Biosciences
- Emmanuelle Charpentier - $CRSP (CRISPR Therapeutics)
- Feng Zhang - $EDIT (Editas Medicine), Sherlock Biosciences
- George Church -a very interesting character
- Martin Jinek
- Philippe Horvath
- Rodolphe Barrangou
- He Jiankui - First reported case of germline edited twin babies
- Jillian Banfield
- Rosalind Franklin - Photo 51 - A
- James Watson - A complicated hero of DNA
- Gregor Mendel - The legend
- And many more
#Books and other resources mentioned in the book
- Gattaca (1997)
- Brave New World
- The Double Helix
- Human Nature ( A Documentary from Netflix)
...
December 8, 2023
Walter Isaacson is a true storyteller, and this book yet another compelling, fast to read, educational, biography. He goes deep into the fascinating and burgeoning world of CRISPR to explain it and its origins. And it's clear that CRISPR is changing the world, and will be something we are all familiar with in the decades to come.
The moral dilemmas CRISPR brings are large, and the book appropriately spends a lot of time on them. So far, most scientists and governments have approached it from the perspective that horrible genetic diseases (eg sickle cell) should be cured, but we shouldn't use it it for other purposes. So, Gattaca and designer babies are possible, but nobody is working on it. However, as the rogue scientist in China showed when he successfully birthed human babies after removing their HIV susceptible genes, it's only a matter of time before other rogue scientists show up. Eg, who knows what's happening in Russia right now...
I really enjoyed the story of how CRISPR was discovered. Isaacson puts a lot of onus on the trait of curiosity across all his biologies (Steve Jobs, Leonardo Da Vinci, etc). And Jennifer Doudna was only a pioneer and discoverer of CRISPR's uses because she was being curious and exploring the bounds of science.
"In the history of science, there are few real eureka moments, but this came pretty close. “It wasn’t just some gradual process where it slowly dawned on us,” Doudna says. “It was an oh-my-God moment.” When Jinek showed Doudna his data demonstrating that you could program Cas9 with different guide RNAs to cut DNA wherever you desired, they actually paused and looked at each other. “Oh my God, this could be a powerful tool for gene editing,” she declared. In short, they realized that they had developed a means to rewrite the code of life."
Very interesting too to learn that lots of animal breeders, cattle farmers, etc are using CRISPR and see lot's of opportunities to use it more.
The drama between scientists discovering CRISPR and the patent wars was an interesting peek inside a world I knew little about. It added to the story, but maybe could have been condensed slightly. OTOH, I get it, he was covering a space not just a person, and needed to tread carefully, which I think he did.
The moral dilemmas CRISPR brings are large, and the book appropriately spends a lot of time on them. So far, most scientists and governments have approached it from the perspective that horrible genetic diseases (eg sickle cell) should be cured, but we shouldn't use it it for other purposes. So, Gattaca and designer babies are possible, but nobody is working on it. However, as the rogue scientist in China showed when he successfully birthed human babies after removing their HIV susceptible genes, it's only a matter of time before other rogue scientists show up. Eg, who knows what's happening in Russia right now...
I really enjoyed the story of how CRISPR was discovered. Isaacson puts a lot of onus on the trait of curiosity across all his biologies (Steve Jobs, Leonardo Da Vinci, etc). And Jennifer Doudna was only a pioneer and discoverer of CRISPR's uses because she was being curious and exploring the bounds of science.
"In the history of science, there are few real eureka moments, but this came pretty close. “It wasn’t just some gradual process where it slowly dawned on us,” Doudna says. “It was an oh-my-God moment.” When Jinek showed Doudna his data demonstrating that you could program Cas9 with different guide RNAs to cut DNA wherever you desired, they actually paused and looked at each other. “Oh my God, this could be a powerful tool for gene editing,” she declared. In short, they realized that they had developed a means to rewrite the code of life."
Very interesting too to learn that lots of animal breeders, cattle farmers, etc are using CRISPR and see lot's of opportunities to use it more.
The drama between scientists discovering CRISPR and the patent wars was an interesting peek inside a world I knew little about. It added to the story, but maybe could have been condensed slightly. OTOH, I get it, he was covering a space not just a person, and needed to tread carefully, which I think he did.
March 26, 2021
I had been literally dying to read this book since when Walter Isaacson posted about this online. Earlier he had authored da Vinci's biohgraphy in 2017. After finishing that book, I wondered whether I would be lucky enough to read another work from him. Yeah, I have been lucky in that sense ~ It took only four years!
Well, what can I say about this book? I am feeling intensely emotioanl about this one and obviously, I would give it A Thousand Stars! Apart from Atul Gawande's "Being Mortal", this is another best-read for me in 2021! Such a brilliant, marvellous piece on CRISPR, its application in genome editing, diagnosing & curing diseases, and how it can be used to fight coronavirus. And most importantly, the star of this book is Jennifer Doudna - the Wonder Woman in science.
I am glad to have finished all the four genius-&-geek biographies from Isaacson: da Vinci, Einstein, Steve Jobs, and finally Jennifer Doudna. Being a long time fan of his work, nothing could give me such pleasure. This book has been very timely - following Jennifer and Emmanuelle's 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry in last October.
Jennifer is the main star of this book. Undoubtedly she has an amazing personality. I really love the way how she is comfortable with her competitiveness and wears it gracefully up in her sleeve while balancing her collegiality and brilliant passion for the splendid research she is doing. This book is really inspiring for me being a woman in science and technology. I particularly enjoyed how versatile and different Jennifer and Emmanuelle are (with respect to one another) as women and researchers as well.
I was deeply moved reading the second last chapter that discusses how CRISPR based technologies and RNA vaccines can be and are indeed being used to fight COVID-19. I lost my father to COVID just a few months before the vaccines reached our country. So, I ended up crying while reading this chapter a few hours ago. All I can say here is that... these people are doing a great job and hopefully their invention will save the lives of our beloved ones!
Well, what can I say about this book? I am feeling intensely emotioanl about this one and obviously, I would give it A Thousand Stars! Apart from Atul Gawande's "Being Mortal", this is another best-read for me in 2021! Such a brilliant, marvellous piece on CRISPR, its application in genome editing, diagnosing & curing diseases, and how it can be used to fight coronavirus. And most importantly, the star of this book is Jennifer Doudna - the Wonder Woman in science.
I am glad to have finished all the four genius-&-geek biographies from Isaacson: da Vinci, Einstein, Steve Jobs, and finally Jennifer Doudna. Being a long time fan of his work, nothing could give me such pleasure. This book has been very timely - following Jennifer and Emmanuelle's 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry in last October.
Jennifer is the main star of this book. Undoubtedly she has an amazing personality. I really love the way how she is comfortable with her competitiveness and wears it gracefully up in her sleeve while balancing her collegiality and brilliant passion for the splendid research she is doing. This book is really inspiring for me being a woman in science and technology. I particularly enjoyed how versatile and different Jennifer and Emmanuelle are (with respect to one another) as women and researchers as well.
I was deeply moved reading the second last chapter that discusses how CRISPR based technologies and RNA vaccines can be and are indeed being used to fight COVID-19. I lost my father to COVID just a few months before the vaccines reached our country. So, I ended up crying while reading this chapter a few hours ago. All I can say here is that... these people are doing a great job and hopefully their invention will save the lives of our beloved ones!
September 9, 2021
I wanted to read more about the scientific basis and ethical implications of genetic modification. I was also interested in the role of CRISPR in the development of vaccines. This book accomplished that, but it told me more about the lives of the scientists and their rivalries than I wanted to know. Most of them have turned their discoveries into business ventures and I had no interest in their race to publish first or their patent lawsuits. The last 20 -25% of the book was the most interesting part to me. It finally got to the ethical issues surrounding gene altering. There was also a discussion of the development of COVID-19 tests and the RNA vaccines. The book was well written, but it just didn’t focus on what interested me most.
May 7, 2025
The scientist does not study nature because it is useful. He studies it because he takes pleasure in it, and he takes pleasure in it because it is beautiful. — Henri Poincaré, Science and Method, 1908
Walter Isaacson has long been one of my favorite biographers and The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race does not disappoint. This was a page-turner, but I admit that I dragged out reading the book for a long time because of the many negative reviews. But not to worry, this was a fascinating book that I loved from the beginning to the end. And Isaacson did well to focus on Jennifer Doudna as the scientist at the heart of the tale throughout the story of these myriad monumental discoveries. It is in this gripping account that Walter Isaacson tells the story of this pioneering scientist, along with her colleagues and rivals, who launched a revolution allowing us to cure diseases and fend off many viruses. In 2012, the Berkeley chemist Jennifer Doudna and her collaborators, discovered the way to edit DNA, known as CRISPR that was deployed to fight the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. But along with this discovery, there were many moral and policy issues that must be reckoned with. Jennifer Doudna has become an important voice in the wrestling of these moral and policy issues. Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier were awarded the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. This recognition came with historic swiftness. There was a sense that this chemistry award was historic as it not only recognized their achievement but seemed to herald the advent of a new era.
And as the author, Walter Isaacson, so eloquently states in his Introduction: “Her life story—as a researcher, Nobel Prize winner, and public policy thinker—connects the CRISPR tale to some larger historical threads, including the role of women in science. Her work also illustrates, as Leonardo da Vinci’s did, that the key to innovation is connecting a curiosity about basic science to the practical work of devising tools that can be applied to our lives—moving discoveries from lab bench to bedside.”
November 6, 2021
DNF at 22%.
Mr. Isaacson and I just don't see eye to eye. Here we find Isaacson tut-tutting over James Watson's sexist treatment of Rosalind Franklin, a crystallographer whose data and interpretation of same were critical to establishing the structure of DNA:
Pretty appalling, and thank goodness we've moved past expressing ideas like this, at least publicly. Oh. Oooops. Wait a minute -- here Mr. Isaacson himself introduces Emmanuelle Charpentier, a freaking Nobel Laureate in biology, as follows:
Some old guys, like this Polish fellow I sometimes encounter in the park while walking my dog, are delightful human beings. And some are not.
Bailed-out buddy read with Vivian and Allie. At least our conversation was interesting!
Mr. Isaacson and I just don't see eye to eye. Here we find Isaacson tut-tutting over James Watson's sexist treatment of Rosalind Franklin, a crystallographer whose data and interpretation of same were critical to establishing the structure of DNA:
Franklin was a focused scientist, sensibly dressed. As a result she ran afoul of English academia's fondness for eccentrics and its tendency to look at women through a sexual lens, attitudes apparent in Watson's descriptions of her. "Though her features were strong, she was not unattractive and might have been quite stunning had she taken even a mild interest in clothes," he wrote. "This she did not. There was never lipstick to contrast with her straight black hair..."
Pretty appalling, and thank goodness we've moved past expressing ideas like this, at least publicly. Oh. Oooops. Wait a minute -- here Mr. Isaacson himself introduces Emmanuelle Charpentier, a freaking Nobel Laureate in biology, as follows:
While attending a conference in Puerto Rico in the spring of 2011, Doudna had a chance meeting with Emmanuelle Charpentier, an itinerant French biologist who had an alluring mix of mystery and Parisian insouciance.The book is littered with stuff like this, at least the portion I managed to hack through -- venture capitalists 'going into heat' at the mention of CRISPR, for example. Yech.
Some old guys, like this Polish fellow I sometimes encounter in the park while walking my dog, are delightful human beings. And some are not.
Bailed-out buddy read with Vivian and Allie. At least our conversation was interesting!
March 29, 2021
The Code Breaker is a gripping account of how the pioneering scientist Jennifer Doudna, along with her colleagues and rivals, launched a revolution that will allow us to cure diseases, fend off viruses, and enhance our children. In the spring of 2012, the Berkeley biochemist Jennifer Doudna and her collaborators turned a curiosity of nature into an invention that will transform the future of the human race: an easy-to-use tool that can edit DNA. Known as CRISPR, it opened a brave new world of medical miracles and moral questions. It has already been deployed to cure deadly diseases, fight the coronavirus pandemic of 2020, and make inheritable changes in the genes of babies. The development of CRISPR and the war against coronavirus will hasten our transition to the next great innovation revolution. The past half-century has been an information-technology era, based on the microchip, the computer, and the internet. Now we are entering an even more momentous era, a life-science revolution. Children who study digital coding will be surpassed by those who study the code of life. Should we use our new evolution-hacking powers to make us less susceptible to viruses and eliminate dreaded disorders?
What a wonderful boon that would be! Right? And what about preventing congenital deafness or blindness? Or being very short? Or being depressed? Hmmm...How should we think about that? Should we allow parents, if they can afford it, to enhance the IQ or height or memory or muscles of their kids? After helping to discover CRISPR, Doudna became a leader in wrestling with these moral and policy issues. Her life story illustrates that the key to innovation is connecting basic science to our everyday lives--moving discoveries from our labs to our bedsides--in ways that respect our moral values. It's a thrilling detective tale that involves the most profound wonders of nature, from the origins of life to the future of our species. This is a compelling and deeply fascinating read by one of the most prominent biography writers of our time. The detail and intricacy are second to none and it is written in an accessible and engaging manner. I found the moral and ethical arguments regarding the use of gene editing incredibly interesting and they are explored in-depth throughout. A riveting, thorough and eminently readable book. The definitive guide to the CRISPR phenomenon. Highly recommended.
What a wonderful boon that would be! Right? And what about preventing congenital deafness or blindness? Or being very short? Or being depressed? Hmmm...How should we think about that? Should we allow parents, if they can afford it, to enhance the IQ or height or memory or muscles of their kids? After helping to discover CRISPR, Doudna became a leader in wrestling with these moral and policy issues. Her life story illustrates that the key to innovation is connecting basic science to our everyday lives--moving discoveries from our labs to our bedsides--in ways that respect our moral values. It's a thrilling detective tale that involves the most profound wonders of nature, from the origins of life to the future of our species. This is a compelling and deeply fascinating read by one of the most prominent biography writers of our time. The detail and intricacy are second to none and it is written in an accessible and engaging manner. I found the moral and ethical arguments regarding the use of gene editing incredibly interesting and they are explored in-depth throughout. A riveting, thorough and eminently readable book. The definitive guide to the CRISPR phenomenon. Highly recommended.
June 14, 2024
In prima jumatate a secolului XX fizica a fost revolutionata de teoriile lui Einstein si de mecanica cuantica.
A urmat revolutia digitala, iar acum suntem intr-o era a revolutiei biologice.
In 1944 s-a identificat ADN-ul ca purtator al informatiei genetice, apoi, Watson si Crick (datorita importantei contributii a lui Rosalind Franklin) i-au determinat structura "de helix dublu spiralat". Frumusetea descoperirii a fascinat-o pe adolescenta Jennifer Doudna, ceea ce a facut sa-si doreasca sa porneasca pe acest drum.
In 1980 un alt pas urias : Cech si Altman descopera ca anumite forme de ARN pot fi enzime, moleculele lor se pot diviza, declansand o reactie chimica. Mai mult, ele pot fi mai importante pentru originea vietii decat ADN, ele pot elimina prin taiere secvente nedorite.
Francisco Mojica face in 1989 descoperire uimitoare : unele bacterii au sistem imunitar, ele putand incorpora o parte din ADN-ul virusului, iar generatiile urmatoare devin imune la el , "ingaduie sistemului sa taie si sa lipeasca noi amintiri de virusuri care ataca bacteria, creaza segmente scurte de ARN care ghideaza o enzima ca o foarfeca catre virus si taie din materialul genetic al acestuia." Astfel s-a nascut sistemul CRISPR si enzimele asociate Cas, despre care se vorbeste mult in carte. Pe baza lor, incepand mai ales cu anii 2000, au curs descoperiri intr-un ritm super accelerat.
Doudna si Charpentier au revolutionat domeniul in 2011 demonstrand ca poti tinti, cu ajutorul unui ghid, secventa de ADN pe care vrei sa o tai, inserand in loc o gena preferata, adica este programabil !
Cartea o are pe Doudna in plan central, dar este despre foarte multi cercetatori care si-au adus contributia, o adevarata competitie in domeniu. S-a recurs la diverse tertipuri, fiecare vrand ca el sa fie primul care publica descoperirea. Nu mi-a placut lupta asta pentru intaietate, dar o inteleg intr-un fel.
M-a mai impresionat cata sustinere are cercetarea in SUA, am descoperit ca este mult mai substantiala decat presupuneam.
Cu stilul sau narativ minunat si multa documentare, Walter Isaacson face si o analiza etica amanuntita : "I-au trebuit naturii milioane de ani sa teasa laolalta cele trei miliarde de nucleotide ale ADN-ului intr-o maniera complexa si ocazional imperfecta pentru a permite existenta minunatei diversitati a speciei umane. E corect sa gandim ca acum putem interveni noi si sa editam acel genom pentru a elimina ceea ce consideram ca sunt imperfectiuni? Ne vom pierde diversitatea?"
Nu imi dau seama ce procent din volumul de informatii de specialitate am inteles (desi explicatiile sunt foarte bune, pe intelesul multora), dar a fost o calatorie care m-a fascinat si fermecat, acum privesc cu totul altfel acest domeniu.
Mi-a placut mult si cartea lui Walter Isaacson despre Einstein.
Neaparat le voi citi si pe cele despre Steve Jobs si Leonardo da Vinci.
Si voi reveni, sper, asupra celor doua citite deja, pentru a le aprofunda.
A urmat revolutia digitala, iar acum suntem intr-o era a revolutiei biologice.
In 1944 s-a identificat ADN-ul ca purtator al informatiei genetice, apoi, Watson si Crick (datorita importantei contributii a lui Rosalind Franklin) i-au determinat structura "de helix dublu spiralat". Frumusetea descoperirii a fascinat-o pe adolescenta Jennifer Doudna, ceea ce a facut sa-si doreasca sa porneasca pe acest drum.
In 1980 un alt pas urias : Cech si Altman descopera ca anumite forme de ARN pot fi enzime, moleculele lor se pot diviza, declansand o reactie chimica. Mai mult, ele pot fi mai importante pentru originea vietii decat ADN, ele pot elimina prin taiere secvente nedorite.
Francisco Mojica face in 1989 descoperire uimitoare : unele bacterii au sistem imunitar, ele putand incorpora o parte din ADN-ul virusului, iar generatiile urmatoare devin imune la el , "ingaduie sistemului sa taie si sa lipeasca noi amintiri de virusuri care ataca bacteria, creaza segmente scurte de ARN care ghideaza o enzima ca o foarfeca catre virus si taie din materialul genetic al acestuia." Astfel s-a nascut sistemul CRISPR si enzimele asociate Cas, despre care se vorbeste mult in carte. Pe baza lor, incepand mai ales cu anii 2000, au curs descoperiri intr-un ritm super accelerat.
Doudna si Charpentier au revolutionat domeniul in 2011 demonstrand ca poti tinti, cu ajutorul unui ghid, secventa de ADN pe care vrei sa o tai, inserand in loc o gena preferata, adica este programabil !
Cartea o are pe Doudna in plan central, dar este despre foarte multi cercetatori care si-au adus contributia, o adevarata competitie in domeniu. S-a recurs la diverse tertipuri, fiecare vrand ca el sa fie primul care publica descoperirea. Nu mi-a placut lupta asta pentru intaietate, dar o inteleg intr-un fel.
M-a mai impresionat cata sustinere are cercetarea in SUA, am descoperit ca este mult mai substantiala decat presupuneam.
Cu stilul sau narativ minunat si multa documentare, Walter Isaacson face si o analiza etica amanuntita : "I-au trebuit naturii milioane de ani sa teasa laolalta cele trei miliarde de nucleotide ale ADN-ului intr-o maniera complexa si ocazional imperfecta pentru a permite existenta minunatei diversitati a speciei umane. E corect sa gandim ca acum putem interveni noi si sa editam acel genom pentru a elimina ceea ce consideram ca sunt imperfectiuni? Ne vom pierde diversitatea?"
Nu imi dau seama ce procent din volumul de informatii de specialitate am inteles (desi explicatiile sunt foarte bune, pe intelesul multora), dar a fost o calatorie care m-a fascinat si fermecat, acum privesc cu totul altfel acest domeniu.
Mi-a placut mult si cartea lui Walter Isaacson despre Einstein.
Neaparat le voi citi si pe cele despre Steve Jobs si Leonardo da Vinci.
Si voi reveni, sper, asupra celor doua citite deja, pentru a le aprofunda.
February 8, 2022
*3.5 stars*
I read The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race for a few reasons, one to have some talking points when people say nonsense about vaccines, and another because I always like to have a "respectable" book to talk to patients about so I don't have to reveal that I enjoy alien/human romances...
I think The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race was very informative, even if the storytelling felt a bit all over the place. Even with my science background, I found some of the advances and the amount of science content to be weighty and hard to follow. I can't imagine how hard it would be for the average reader.
I'd imagine that it's pretty difficult to write a cohesive book about this topic, especially since it's all still evolving. However, the story didn't really feel like it was about Jennifer Doudna, but sort of an overview of how we got to the place we are with gene editing.
Truthfully, this book took me over a month to listen to, and though I enjoyed it, I had a hard time retaining much of the knowledge after the fact. Possibly the topic is just too dense for me, and possibly the author had a hard time paring down and organizing some of the facts of CRISPR.
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May 2, 2021
This is a thrilling account of the very recent history of CRISPR Cas9 gene editing technology.
Of equal interest and import.
The book sheds light on how sexism racism and xenophobia play out in contemporary science.
For those readers (like me) who are still fuzzy on CRISPR...
CRISPR (pronounced crisper) is an acronym for: clustered (C) regularly (R) interspaced (I) short (S) palindromic (P) repeats (R).
CRISPR is a type of DNA sequence, found in bacteria that have previously been infected by a virus or other invading organism.
Apparently, when a virus infects a bacteria, it inserts a little RNA =>DNA sequence into the host cell.
Think of how a computer virus hacks into your operating system by inserting sequences of additional code.
CRISPR sequences develop as an immune response to these ‘alien’ virus DNA sequences, and function as tiny little ‘seek and destroy’ agents that ‘edit’ out the viral DNA sequences and protect against similar future attacks.
CRISPR-associated protein 9 (Cas9) is an enzyme that uses CRISPR to edit DNA.
Cas9 enzymes together with CRISPR sequences form the basis of a technology known as CRISPR-Cas9 used to edit genes within living organisms.
CRISPR-Cas9 systems can be ‘programmed’ relatively easily and inexpensively, to conduct ‘germline editing’ (i.e. insertion of designer DNA, or deletion of unwanted DNA) into the organism’s genetic code.
And here’s the catch:
The edits are heritable i.e. the genetically modified organism will pass that ‘designer’ genetic code to their offspring.
And here’s the other catch:
It works on humans.
So wholly fucking shit!
And here’s the other, other catch:
At least three designer human babies have been hatched, in haste and without oversight, and without a complete understanding of the downstream effects, or ethical ramifications.
Dude!
This all started in 2012 when Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna dropped a seminal (no pun intended) paper on CRISPR Cas9.
And amost instantly, the scientific community recognized the implications.
Basically: people, can (easily and inexpensively) hack and edit the genetic code of all living organisms, at will, for better or worse.
This launched a vicious knife fight slash death race for patentable CRISPR based technologies.
Charpentier and Doudna are basic (not applied) researchers, working at public universities, and are as such, not so savvy in patent law and the patent application process.
A then Stanford researcher named Feng Zhang (more recently affiliated with the Broad Center for the Biological Sciences at Cal Tech) beat Carpenter and Doudna to the punch on patent after patent.
Sometimes by as little as a day or two.
Largely by being adroit at operating within the patent system and due to being well funded and supported in his enterprises.
Apparently, private universities are geared towards patent acquisition on applied research, and all that translates into big dollars for the institutions and the researchers.
Subsequently, Feng Zhang (a guy) nearly made off with all the cash and prizes and in doing so, nearly stole the historical spotlight from Charpentier and Doudna (both women).
This is particularly egregious due (in part) to the fact Watson and Crick (both guys) essentially stole research from Rosalind Franklin (a women) that ended up being a mission critical game changer in their race to discover the structure of DNA.
Even though much has changed since the 1960’s, women in science still experience HUGE institutional sexism.
And this male v female, basic v applied, public v private showdown almost ended up in a very wounding and unsightly recapitulation of that famously uncool chapter of recent history.
Charpentier and Doudna eventually won the 2020 Nobel prize in chemistry.
So good.
But it got UGLY.
Very very UGLY.
To amp it up a little more.
As you may have gathered, Feng Zhang is Chinese American.
And Charpentier and Doudna are European (French national) and American.
So now we can stir a little (or a lot) of racism and cultural mistrust into the mix.
And then COVID-19 happened.
And CRISPR Cas9 ended up being a key technology in producing the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines that just might save all of our biscuits.
Messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) translates genetic information embedded in DNA into instructions for protein synthesis.
An mRNA vaccine uses mRNA to stimulate the previously mentioned CRISPER based processes that ‘seek and destroy’ the alien virus DNA sequences.
In a nutshell, Charpentier, Doudna and Feng Zhang all (somehow) ended up (sort of) collaborating on various (openly shared) COVID-19 testing and vaccine procedures.
This also entailed collaboration between corperate and educational entities.
Something that doesn’t happen often.
Which is too bad because the two cultures have something valuable to teach each other.
Apparently, internecine conflict between scientists in academia is BAD, and interdisciplinary team collaboration in industry ends up being pretty GOOD.
Academia is the source of the basic research that industry applies to make important stuff like vaccines.
So in our current system we need both basic and applied research. And it would be nice if the the best of academia could pair with the best of industry to produce important stuff (like vaccines) in a hurry.
Which is apparently what happened in the case of those miraculously fast and cheap COVID-19 vaccines many of us (and hopefully most of us pretty soon) received.
So if you’re still with me at this point.
The plot thickens.
In 2019 a Chinese national scientist named He Jiankui conducted a germline editing process on (x3) embryos, essentially birthing the world's first gene-edited babies.
He did it pretty much in secret, and without ethical or technical oversight.
And now.
Wait for it.
The human gene pool has just been modified with pretty much no real understanding of the ramifications.
So that happened.
He Jiankui was convicted and sentenced to prison for three years for violating a government ban on doing homespun experiments on human embryos.
But the gene genie is pretty much out of the bottle.
You can expect a near future full of similar bio-hacking, for good and for malice, that way way way outpaces our ethical and legal systems ability to shape and control it.
As should be apparent.
This is an extremely rich text about a recent scientific advance that has already changed a lot, and will probably end up changing everything.
Walter Isaacson is an AMAZING biographer.
Great book.
5 ⭐️’s
Of equal interest and import.
The book sheds light on how sexism racism and xenophobia play out in contemporary science.
For those readers (like me) who are still fuzzy on CRISPR...
CRISPR (pronounced crisper) is an acronym for: clustered (C) regularly (R) interspaced (I) short (S) palindromic (P) repeats (R).
CRISPR is a type of DNA sequence, found in bacteria that have previously been infected by a virus or other invading organism.
Apparently, when a virus infects a bacteria, it inserts a little RNA =>DNA sequence into the host cell.
Think of how a computer virus hacks into your operating system by inserting sequences of additional code.
CRISPR sequences develop as an immune response to these ‘alien’ virus DNA sequences, and function as tiny little ‘seek and destroy’ agents that ‘edit’ out the viral DNA sequences and protect against similar future attacks.
CRISPR-associated protein 9 (Cas9) is an enzyme that uses CRISPR to edit DNA.
Cas9 enzymes together with CRISPR sequences form the basis of a technology known as CRISPR-Cas9 used to edit genes within living organisms.
CRISPR-Cas9 systems can be ‘programmed’ relatively easily and inexpensively, to conduct ‘germline editing’ (i.e. insertion of designer DNA, or deletion of unwanted DNA) into the organism’s genetic code.
And here’s the catch:
The edits are heritable i.e. the genetically modified organism will pass that ‘designer’ genetic code to their offspring.
And here’s the other catch:
It works on humans.
So wholly fucking shit!
And here’s the other, other catch:
At least three designer human babies have been hatched, in haste and without oversight, and without a complete understanding of the downstream effects, or ethical ramifications.
Dude!
This all started in 2012 when Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna dropped a seminal (no pun intended) paper on CRISPR Cas9.
And amost instantly, the scientific community recognized the implications.
Basically: people, can (easily and inexpensively) hack and edit the genetic code of all living organisms, at will, for better or worse.
This launched a vicious knife fight slash death race for patentable CRISPR based technologies.
Charpentier and Doudna are basic (not applied) researchers, working at public universities, and are as such, not so savvy in patent law and the patent application process.
A then Stanford researcher named Feng Zhang (more recently affiliated with the Broad Center for the Biological Sciences at Cal Tech) beat Carpenter and Doudna to the punch on patent after patent.
Sometimes by as little as a day or two.
Largely by being adroit at operating within the patent system and due to being well funded and supported in his enterprises.
Apparently, private universities are geared towards patent acquisition on applied research, and all that translates into big dollars for the institutions and the researchers.
Subsequently, Feng Zhang (a guy) nearly made off with all the cash and prizes and in doing so, nearly stole the historical spotlight from Charpentier and Doudna (both women).
This is particularly egregious due (in part) to the fact Watson and Crick (both guys) essentially stole research from Rosalind Franklin (a women) that ended up being a mission critical game changer in their race to discover the structure of DNA.
Even though much has changed since the 1960’s, women in science still experience HUGE institutional sexism.
And this male v female, basic v applied, public v private showdown almost ended up in a very wounding and unsightly recapitulation of that famously uncool chapter of recent history.
Charpentier and Doudna eventually won the 2020 Nobel prize in chemistry.
So good.
But it got UGLY.
Very very UGLY.
To amp it up a little more.
As you may have gathered, Feng Zhang is Chinese American.
And Charpentier and Doudna are European (French national) and American.
So now we can stir a little (or a lot) of racism and cultural mistrust into the mix.
And then COVID-19 happened.
And CRISPR Cas9 ended up being a key technology in producing the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines that just might save all of our biscuits.
Messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) translates genetic information embedded in DNA into instructions for protein synthesis.
An mRNA vaccine uses mRNA to stimulate the previously mentioned CRISPER based processes that ‘seek and destroy’ the alien virus DNA sequences.
In a nutshell, Charpentier, Doudna and Feng Zhang all (somehow) ended up (sort of) collaborating on various (openly shared) COVID-19 testing and vaccine procedures.
This also entailed collaboration between corperate and educational entities.
Something that doesn’t happen often.
Which is too bad because the two cultures have something valuable to teach each other.
Apparently, internecine conflict between scientists in academia is BAD, and interdisciplinary team collaboration in industry ends up being pretty GOOD.
Academia is the source of the basic research that industry applies to make important stuff like vaccines.
So in our current system we need both basic and applied research. And it would be nice if the the best of academia could pair with the best of industry to produce important stuff (like vaccines) in a hurry.
Which is apparently what happened in the case of those miraculously fast and cheap COVID-19 vaccines many of us (and hopefully most of us pretty soon) received.
So if you’re still with me at this point.
The plot thickens.
In 2019 a Chinese national scientist named He Jiankui conducted a germline editing process on (x3) embryos, essentially birthing the world's first gene-edited babies.
He did it pretty much in secret, and without ethical or technical oversight.
And now.
Wait for it.
The human gene pool has just been modified with pretty much no real understanding of the ramifications.
So that happened.
He Jiankui was convicted and sentenced to prison for three years for violating a government ban on doing homespun experiments on human embryos.
But the gene genie is pretty much out of the bottle.
You can expect a near future full of similar bio-hacking, for good and for malice, that way way way outpaces our ethical and legal systems ability to shape and control it.
As should be apparent.
This is an extremely rich text about a recent scientific advance that has already changed a lot, and will probably end up changing everything.
Walter Isaacson is an AMAZING biographer.
Great book.
5 ⭐️’s
September 13, 2022
“I began this journey thinking that biotechnology was the next great scientific revolution, a subject that was filled with awe-inspiring natural wonders, research rivalries, thrilling discoveries, lifesaving triumphs, and creative pioneers such as Jennifer Doudna, Emmanuelle Charpentier, and Feng Zhang. The Year of the Plague made me realize I was understating the case.” --Walter Isaacson, in the epilogue of The Code Breaker
The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race (2021) is not your traditional biography. It’s also a history of the biotech field, the people driving it forward, a COVID-19 story, and a love letter to science and curiosity. The multifaceted focus of The Code Breaker may turn some people off to the book because it doesn’t conform to the standard model for a biography, e.g. an examination of one person’s life story and a litany of their achievements. That only makes me enjoy the book even more.
As with all books coming out in late 2020 and early 2021, COVID-19 manages (of course) to become part of the story. Admittedly, I found that my favorite part of The Code Breaker was the applied science behind the development of COVID testing kits and the swift roll-out of the mRNA vaccines we needed to beat back the ongoing pandemic. And that the process that lead to these breakthroughs was achieved by an open cross-disciplinary collaboration. So awesome!
Gotta find the silver lining of how the pandemic has catalyzed some good things in addition to the bad!
I won’t pretend to understand all of the science related to DNA, RNA, and CRISPR technology. Despite that, it was exciting to contemplate along with the author and the scientists Isaacson interviewed the many other ways mRNA technology could be used, such as developing more effective treatments for cancer and customizable vaccines for future novel viruses.
It’s that excitement that this book can instill in even general readers for the promise of CRISPR-related tech and for science in general that I regard as The Code Breaker’s biggest success. After all, the COVID-19 vaccines can be traced back to the curiosity of countless scientists trying to understand how bacteria fight off viruses.
Read this book. Indulge your curiosity. You never know where it may lead.
-Cora
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February 15, 2022
Thoughts soon.
August 3, 2021
Walter Isaacson has, in Code Breaker, made an excellent argument for the value of basic scientific research. When biochemists first understood what the "junk DNA" in bacteria were designed to do, it was to all appearances, an interesting but inconsequential discovery. The junk DNA was actually part of the bacteria's immune system; the bacteria used RNA to extract snippets of attacking virus' genetic code in order to remember them next time and attack the dangerous viruses. As time went on, other scientists realized that if bacteria could modify their own DNA, it might be useful to understand how they do it; and then it was a short step from that discovery to finding a way to use the method to create vaccines that employed messenger RNA to allow humans' immune system to recognize and fend off viruses. A 'short step' is a bit of an exaggeration; it took ten years of hard work for scientists to be in position to create the Pfizer, Moderna, Astra-Zeneca, and J&J vaccines in record time. But that's the pay off from basic research, and that's why countries should fund it, and support it through thick and thin. You never know when you are going to desperately need the skills of scientists like Doudna and Feng.
One area where I feel the book falls short is in emphasizing personal stories at the expense of explaining the science thoroughly. A topic like this would benefit from a chapter like Melville's on Cetology (well maybe not exactly like Melville's); what I mean is the author should have inserted a chapter that was the equivalent of an introductory college class on mRNA, gene editing, etc, with illustrations. What we get in terms of illustrations is many, many pictures of scientists - replace about half of those with illustrative drawings of the various natural and man-made processes for gene editing, and those who are so inclined (I would be one) could study those and come to a clear understanding of the science and technology involved. Walter Isaacson is at heart a journalist, and he loves human interest stories; I love them to a point, and Doudna's story is inspiring and a great example for women who are interested in science, but Mr. Isaacson would have benefited from the ministrations of a much stricter editor; all that human interest stuff could be cut by a third and the story would not suffer. In my opinion. But then, I am a STEM guy at heart, so my tolerance for human interest stories is inherently limited.....;-)
In addition, I think Isaacson spends far too much time on James Watson, who is not a factor in modern gene editing. His is an interesting and ultimately sad story that could be covered in a few pages.
Isaacson goes on at length (if I knew how to underline those last two words in GRs reviews I would do it) about moral and ethical concerns of gene editing. The ethics side of the debate and comes down to this, I think: if we know, or we think we know, how to cure death sentence diseases like Huntington's, or the unnamed neonatal affliction that Doudna mentions, we should do that if the individuals are willing. My son had a wonderful grade school teacher whose husband died from ALS; if we could do in vivo DNA editing to save a person like that, assuming they were willing, why wouldn't we try to?
I personally believe we need an international agreement that restricts efforts at editing heritable traits to elimination of diseases like the above. It would be easy, if common sense prevailed, to come up with such a list of diseases. All that said, what is my confidence that China or Russia would abide by such an agreement? Essentially zero. But the EU would comply, the Anglophone world would, Japan and Korea and Taiwan and Singapore would. The main reason for such restrictions is not to prevent Russia from, as Putin says, designing "super soldiers", it is because we currently understand the human genome so incompletely, that it is reckless and unwise to try to go after anything but diseases where if we do nothing, the result will be death. In those dire cases there is almost nothing to lose, and often those diseases are triggered by a small number of genes, making them far easier to cure. Other characteristics, like intelligence or height are so broad-based genetically, that trying to enhance them is almost certain to be a fools errand, or worse, given our lack of knowledge. We should be very wary of unintended consequences when it comes to genetic modifications. What I just said above, in one paragraph, Isaacson took about 70 pages to say, hence my mild impatience with his approach to that area of discussion.
Overall, I am glad I read this book. Popular science books, which this could be called, do real good. If you are not educated on the basic science of DNA and RNA and gene editing, or even if you are, but perhaps it was long time ago, a primer which simplifies and explain concepts is entirely right and fitting, despite scientists' general scorn for such books. That scorn is misplaced; the general population desperately needs to understand and appreciate science more than they do at present, and if popular science books can do that we need many, many more of them. Maybe if we focused on science education more than we do, of which popular science books are a component, we might have fewer conspiracy theories about vaccines (among other things) in the US. One of the reasons I wanted to read this was that I was truly astonished in December of last year when it was announced that vaccines were ready for roll-out, and I wanted to understand how it was done so quickly. The COVID vaccines are just the first of such CRISPR-inspired cures that are coming in the next few years, so even if you don't read this book, pay attention to the work being done in this area.
One area where I feel the book falls short is in emphasizing personal stories at the expense of explaining the science thoroughly. A topic like this would benefit from a chapter like Melville's on Cetology (well maybe not exactly like Melville's); what I mean is the author should have inserted a chapter that was the equivalent of an introductory college class on mRNA, gene editing, etc, with illustrations. What we get in terms of illustrations is many, many pictures of scientists - replace about half of those with illustrative drawings of the various natural and man-made processes for gene editing, and those who are so inclined (I would be one) could study those and come to a clear understanding of the science and technology involved. Walter Isaacson is at heart a journalist, and he loves human interest stories; I love them to a point, and Doudna's story is inspiring and a great example for women who are interested in science, but Mr. Isaacson would have benefited from the ministrations of a much stricter editor; all that human interest stuff could be cut by a third and the story would not suffer. In my opinion. But then, I am a STEM guy at heart, so my tolerance for human interest stories is inherently limited.....;-)
In addition, I think Isaacson spends far too much time on James Watson, who is not a factor in modern gene editing. His is an interesting and ultimately sad story that could be covered in a few pages.
Isaacson goes on at length (if I knew how to underline those last two words in GRs reviews I would do it) about moral and ethical concerns of gene editing. The ethics side of the debate and comes down to this, I think: if we know, or we think we know, how to cure death sentence diseases like Huntington's, or the unnamed neonatal affliction that Doudna mentions, we should do that if the individuals are willing. My son had a wonderful grade school teacher whose husband died from ALS; if we could do in vivo DNA editing to save a person like that, assuming they were willing, why wouldn't we try to?
I personally believe we need an international agreement that restricts efforts at editing heritable traits to elimination of diseases like the above. It would be easy, if common sense prevailed, to come up with such a list of diseases. All that said, what is my confidence that China or Russia would abide by such an agreement? Essentially zero. But the EU would comply, the Anglophone world would, Japan and Korea and Taiwan and Singapore would. The main reason for such restrictions is not to prevent Russia from, as Putin says, designing "super soldiers", it is because we currently understand the human genome so incompletely, that it is reckless and unwise to try to go after anything but diseases where if we do nothing, the result will be death. In those dire cases there is almost nothing to lose, and often those diseases are triggered by a small number of genes, making them far easier to cure. Other characteristics, like intelligence or height are so broad-based genetically, that trying to enhance them is almost certain to be a fools errand, or worse, given our lack of knowledge. We should be very wary of unintended consequences when it comes to genetic modifications. What I just said above, in one paragraph, Isaacson took about 70 pages to say, hence my mild impatience with his approach to that area of discussion.
Overall, I am glad I read this book. Popular science books, which this could be called, do real good. If you are not educated on the basic science of DNA and RNA and gene editing, or even if you are, but perhaps it was long time ago, a primer which simplifies and explain concepts is entirely right and fitting, despite scientists' general scorn for such books. That scorn is misplaced; the general population desperately needs to understand and appreciate science more than they do at present, and if popular science books can do that we need many, many more of them. Maybe if we focused on science education more than we do, of which popular science books are a component, we might have fewer conspiracy theories about vaccines (among other things) in the US. One of the reasons I wanted to read this was that I was truly astonished in December of last year when it was announced that vaccines were ready for roll-out, and I wanted to understand how it was done so quickly. The COVID vaccines are just the first of such CRISPR-inspired cures that are coming in the next few years, so even if you don't read this book, pay attention to the work being done in this area.
March 7, 2023
3 Stars for The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and The Future of the Human Race (audiobook) by Walter Isaacson read by Kathe Mazur.
DNF at 50%. This is a interesting story. I thought the story was going to be about Jennifer Doudna. Instead it’s a fan trying to defend her reputation. Maybe she has been wronged and needs defending. The story is about several scientists and their different motivations and how they capitalized on their discovery. Some were aggressive and cutthroat and some were passive and non confrontational and were apparently left on the sidelines.
DNF at 50%. This is a interesting story. I thought the story was going to be about Jennifer Doudna. Instead it’s a fan trying to defend her reputation. Maybe she has been wronged and needs defending. The story is about several scientists and their different motivations and how they capitalized on their discovery. Some were aggressive and cutthroat and some were passive and non confrontational and were apparently left on the sidelines.
March 30, 2021
Walter Isaacson’s The Code Breaker is full of some really smart people. Now while nobody in their right mind would ever describe me as smart (usually the descriptions tend to veer towards: well-meaning, doing the best he can with what he has, unusually sticky, and strangely flavorful. But never smart.), and while many of the scientific details in The Code Breaker were a struggle for me to comprehend (at the conclusion of this book my poor pecan-sized brain felt like it had just completed 16 non-stop hours of Jane Fonda’s step aerobics and abdominal workout) Isaacson’s newest book was really enjoyable and intriguing.
Apparently there are these things in our bodies called DNA and these molecules contain genetic code. Really smart people like Jennifer Doudna and her fierce rival Feng Zheng and a crap-ton of scientists working in fancy universities that would never accept me such as Berkeley, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, etc. are working to use these genetic codes to target and possibly edit DNA. This could lead to the treatment of many diseases or possibly the enhancement of traits (we could all become super strong, athletic, and smart. Personally, I hope they will be able to identify the genes that make a man unusually sticky and strangely flavorful and for the love of God turn them off).
Interestingly, while these scientists are undeniably super smart and can solve a Rubik’s Cube in mere seconds, in many ways they are also like toddlers wanting to be looked at and noticed. “Look at me, look at me,” they cry and stomp and kick in the fit of some scientist tantrum. “I did this first.” Most of this is due to the fact that the first ones making discoveries get the patents.
The Code Breaker becomes timely in the final chapters as these big brainers push past their differences, hug it out, and work together to create testing, vaccines, and possibly genetic treatments for our old friend COVID-19. Isaacson show why he is a renowned biographer of ground breaking individuals. The story here is exciting and cutting edge. While it made my poor atrophied brain convulse in exertion I would still recommend it to those willing to take the risk.
Apparently there are these things in our bodies called DNA and these molecules contain genetic code. Really smart people like Jennifer Doudna and her fierce rival Feng Zheng and a crap-ton of scientists working in fancy universities that would never accept me such as Berkeley, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, etc. are working to use these genetic codes to target and possibly edit DNA. This could lead to the treatment of many diseases or possibly the enhancement of traits (we could all become super strong, athletic, and smart. Personally, I hope they will be able to identify the genes that make a man unusually sticky and strangely flavorful and for the love of God turn them off).
Interestingly, while these scientists are undeniably super smart and can solve a Rubik’s Cube in mere seconds, in many ways they are also like toddlers wanting to be looked at and noticed. “Look at me, look at me,” they cry and stomp and kick in the fit of some scientist tantrum. “I did this first.” Most of this is due to the fact that the first ones making discoveries get the patents.
The Code Breaker becomes timely in the final chapters as these big brainers push past their differences, hug it out, and work together to create testing, vaccines, and possibly genetic treatments for our old friend COVID-19. Isaacson show why he is a renowned biographer of ground breaking individuals. The story here is exciting and cutting edge. While it made my poor atrophied brain convulse in exertion I would still recommend it to those willing to take the risk.
February 13, 2021
Isaacson is a biographer’s biographer and THE CODE BREAKER shows why his books totally absorb us. He has a way of revealing absorbing truth about his subjects — in this case, biochemist and gene scientist Jennifer Doudna, winner of the 2020 Nobel Prize for the revolutionary DNA-editing tool called CRISPR.
Jennifer’s father gave her a copy of The Double Helix when she was six, sparking her keen interest in gene research. Later its author, James Watson, said her CRISPR development was “the most important biological advance since his co-discovery of the structure of DNA.”
I can only say, “Thank you!” to Jennifer as she races to apply her work to eliminating disease and viruses that include COVID. Her life is a triumph. So is THE CODE BREAKER!
5 of 5 Stars
Pub Date 09 Mar 2021
#TheCodeBreaker #NetGalley
Thanks to the author, Simon & Schuster, and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.
Jennifer’s father gave her a copy of The Double Helix when she was six, sparking her keen interest in gene research. Later its author, James Watson, said her CRISPR development was “the most important biological advance since his co-discovery of the structure of DNA.”
I can only say, “Thank you!” to Jennifer as she races to apply her work to eliminating disease and viruses that include COVID. Her life is a triumph. So is THE CODE BREAKER!
5 of 5 Stars
Pub Date 09 Mar 2021
#TheCodeBreaker #NetGalley
Thanks to the author, Simon & Schuster, and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.
November 3, 2021
When O started reading this book I was a bout weary about it. Even though I believe in science whole heartedly I'm not very knowledgeable about the in and outs of it. But ai was intrigued that this what about a woman and her research sounded interesting so I decided to give it a go. I'm so glad I did. It was an very informative book with a lot of interesting facts and such. Wasn't aware it was going to mention a lot of other people as well. The other biographies by Walter Isaacson had focuses on one person at a time but I still enjoyed it
April 2, 2021
What a beautiful, remarkable book! The Code Breaker by Walter Isaacson is about fathoming the joyful and inspiring wonders of life through the lens of CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) which are the hallmark of a bacterial defense system that forms the basis for CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing technology. Scientific in nature, but Isaacson's approach is akin to a detective novel where tensions and conflicts loom in the race of brilliant scientists to finally discover the secrets of genes and how to edit it for treatment of gene-related diseases. I am not a science person but I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would. One thing is certain: great discoveries are not singular but collaborative in nature, across all fields and personalities. Here, you'll meet so many people who have contributed, one way or another, to the discovery of CRISPR, and how, in this time of pandemic, this gene-editing tool will have a great impact in our lives. I highly recommend this book!
July 23, 2022
This book pretends to be a biography, but actually it's about gene editing. About twenty percent of the book is about Jennifer Doudna, forty percent is history of gene editing up to the present, and forty percent is speculation about the future of gene editing.
The discovery, analysis, and eventual understanding of the mechanism of CRISPR involves a whole host of characters each building on earlier work, so it's a bit puzzling why Walter Isaacson didn't make this a multiple biography like he did in the book, The Innovators. Code Breaker does end up with numerous mini biographies much like The Innovators.
As it turned out the CRISPR story includes some tales of lawsuits caused by the final dash—and subterfuge—for patent rights. Scrambling to get findings published first in a science journal made these scientists look like conceded narcissists. Then when things advanced to the awards stage I was sorry to see some old friendships and partnerships chill as a result of jealousy.
Back in 2017 I read and reviewed A Crack in Creation: Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution, by Jennifer A. Doudna and Samuel H. Sternberg. I was more excited about CRISPR back in those days so my review contains more discussion of the details. For this review I've decided not to try to explain the workings of CRISPR.
The second half of the book contains a lengthy discussion of morals and ethics, speculation on the future of gene editing, and an account on the scientific community's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, there's a short chapter on the social demise of James D. Watson of double helix fame. Early in this book Watson's book, The Double Helix is described as having been an inspiration to Doudna as a young girl to study science. But in Watson's later years he became an embarrassment to the scientific community.
It was good to read about how the scientific community responded to the COVID-19 crisis by open sourcing research information to be used toward the development of test kits and related research. This book offers a short description of the various types of vaccines and the history of their development. There is a also a short description of the bureaucratic idiocy related to the CDC's delay in development of an approved COVID test.
The discovery, analysis, and eventual understanding of the mechanism of CRISPR involves a whole host of characters each building on earlier work, so it's a bit puzzling why Walter Isaacson didn't make this a multiple biography like he did in the book, The Innovators. Code Breaker does end up with numerous mini biographies much like The Innovators.
As it turned out the CRISPR story includes some tales of lawsuits caused by the final dash—and subterfuge—for patent rights. Scrambling to get findings published first in a science journal made these scientists look like conceded narcissists. Then when things advanced to the awards stage I was sorry to see some old friendships and partnerships chill as a result of jealousy.
Back in 2017 I read and reviewed A Crack in Creation: Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution, by Jennifer A. Doudna and Samuel H. Sternberg. I was more excited about CRISPR back in those days so my review contains more discussion of the details. For this review I've decided not to try to explain the workings of CRISPR.
The second half of the book contains a lengthy discussion of morals and ethics, speculation on the future of gene editing, and an account on the scientific community's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, there's a short chapter on the social demise of James D. Watson of double helix fame. Early in this book Watson's book, The Double Helix is described as having been an inspiration to Doudna as a young girl to study science. But in Watson's later years he became an embarrassment to the scientific community.
It was good to read about how the scientific community responded to the COVID-19 crisis by open sourcing research information to be used toward the development of test kits and related research. This book offers a short description of the various types of vaccines and the history of their development. There is a also a short description of the bureaucratic idiocy related to the CDC's delay in development of an approved COVID test.
March 11, 2021
"One fundamental aspect of science will remain the same. It has always been a collaboration across generations, from Darwin and Mendel to Watson and Crick and Franklin to Doudna and Charpentier."
I simply have no words to express how much I loved this amazing and historically recorded book. Walter Isaacson! Sir, you have such a diverse taste in science, arts and literature.
The books narrates in a story-like manner, the journey from DNA to RNA and from RNA to CRISPR. Science has never ceased to amaze mankind, and it never will. Being once related very closely to science, I thought I always stay updated with the ongoing research. But how wrong I was. This book uncovers, peel after peel, the wonders each lab, each scientist has performed to make it possible. This past decade changes a lot for the mankind.
"This year's [Nobel] prize is about rewriting the code of life." How beautiful. And how magical. This book has been so much to me; a refresher course of molecular biology, a reminder of my love for pipettes and PCR. It took me back to the confusion of repeating an experiment and taking an innovation as an error...getting published, waiting for reviewers comments, learning that we finally are a step ahead, that eureka moment.
I would recommend this book to all those who love biology, science or even love mankind.
❤
I simply have no words to express how much I loved this amazing and historically recorded book. Walter Isaacson! Sir, you have such a diverse taste in science, arts and literature.
The books narrates in a story-like manner, the journey from DNA to RNA and from RNA to CRISPR. Science has never ceased to amaze mankind, and it never will. Being once related very closely to science, I thought I always stay updated with the ongoing research. But how wrong I was. This book uncovers, peel after peel, the wonders each lab, each scientist has performed to make it possible. This past decade changes a lot for the mankind.
"This year's [Nobel] prize is about rewriting the code of life." How beautiful. And how magical. This book has been so much to me; a refresher course of molecular biology, a reminder of my love for pipettes and PCR. It took me back to the confusion of repeating an experiment and taking an innovation as an error...getting published, waiting for reviewers comments, learning that we finally are a step ahead, that eureka moment.
I would recommend this book to all those who love biology, science or even love mankind.
❤
December 29, 2024
DNF at page 50, I can't abide this! The narrative voice is pulling me through this account like Disney through a fairytale; waggishly white-washed and aglitter with fairydust. Nothing Grimm going on here!
Are there not more objective, less sugar coated, accounts available?
Picked this up at our LFL, and will soon be dropping it back off 🙃.
Intended for the Long Books Challenge, and, at 2" thick, was at least able to clear some shelf space 😆 😘📚 🧚♀️🙋🏼!
Are there not more objective, less sugar coated, accounts available?
Picked this up at our LFL, and will soon be dropping it back off 🙃.
Intended for the Long Books Challenge, and, at 2" thick, was at least able to clear some shelf space 😆 😘📚 🧚♀️🙋🏼!
May 12, 2025
Jennifer Doudna and her French colleague, Emmanuel Carpentier, won the 2020 Nobel Prize for Chemistry. They won for their work in CRISPR technology, Gene Editing, and ultimately for Coronavirus testing & vaccines.
Walter Isaacson includes mini bios for many of the scientists included in Doudna’s story and there are quite a few. At first, I was frustrated by all the incremental information - get on with it, already! As his work progressed, peeling the onion of her life’s story, I see the value of understanding the motivation for these scientists; not all are created equally. Many of the details of Doudna’s life are glossed over so don’t expect a Hollywood style biography. Details are given as they relate to people and events of science, her personal life is not.
Doudna is an interesting woman due to the fact that she is really quite “normal” in her brilliance for bio chemistry. I was struck by her genuine affection for her co-workers that’s evidenced in the included photos as well as some of the lengths she went to helping competition. She states that money is not her motivation but “publish or perish” is ingrained in most academics and even that seems to be under developed in Jennifer. THAT will become an issue...
Parts of this formidable volume read like a thriller. There’s intrigue, court battles, and friends with misunderstandings. Part Seven consists of 5 chapters that discuss the issues of ethics as relates to DNA and changing the structure of life, ordering the structure of life. Who has the right? Who controls the rights? Is it right at all? These are supremely serious questions that should be considered by every adult.
It would be helpful to have some science background when reading this book, but it’s not impossible without it. There are excellent footnotes to assist and if you get the Kindle version, they are interactive, which makes look ups SO much easier! Otherwise, this is definitely a worthy read. It’s very well written, challenging and up to the minute with information on the science of biochemistry and gene editing. The ethical issues should have people talking for a good, long time. The medical manifestations should have people living a healthy, long time. God Bless Us, Everyone📚
Walter Isaacson includes mini bios for many of the scientists included in Doudna’s story and there are quite a few. At first, I was frustrated by all the incremental information - get on with it, already! As his work progressed, peeling the onion of her life’s story, I see the value of understanding the motivation for these scientists; not all are created equally. Many of the details of Doudna’s life are glossed over so don’t expect a Hollywood style biography. Details are given as they relate to people and events of science, her personal life is not.
Doudna is an interesting woman due to the fact that she is really quite “normal” in her brilliance for bio chemistry. I was struck by her genuine affection for her co-workers that’s evidenced in the included photos as well as some of the lengths she went to helping competition. She states that money is not her motivation but “publish or perish” is ingrained in most academics and even that seems to be under developed in Jennifer. THAT will become an issue...
Parts of this formidable volume read like a thriller. There’s intrigue, court battles, and friends with misunderstandings. Part Seven consists of 5 chapters that discuss the issues of ethics as relates to DNA and changing the structure of life, ordering the structure of life. Who has the right? Who controls the rights? Is it right at all? These are supremely serious questions that should be considered by every adult.
It would be helpful to have some science background when reading this book, but it’s not impossible without it. There are excellent footnotes to assist and if you get the Kindle version, they are interactive, which makes look ups SO much easier! Otherwise, this is definitely a worthy read. It’s very well written, challenging and up to the minute with information on the science of biochemistry and gene editing. The ethical issues should have people talking for a good, long time. The medical manifestations should have people living a healthy, long time. God Bless Us, Everyone📚
April 9, 2023
Book on CD read by Kathe Mazur and Walter Isaacson
5*****
Subtitle: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race
This is an engaging, interesting, informative, and thought-provoking biography cum history. While the focus is on Jennifer Doudna, Isaacson gives almost equal time to the many other researchers who contributed to the scientific discoveries and applications.
The book starts out with basic biographical background, moves into the excitement of discovery and the international race to obtain patents, and to publish first, then on to ethical questions surrounding the application of new technologies, and finally focuses on the ways that these teams of scientists worked to address COVID19.
Isaacson frequently puts himself into the narrative, writing in first person about his encounters and reactions.
The audiobook is narrated by Kathe Mazur, with an introduction and epilogue narrated by Isaacson. I was happy that I had the text handy because there are times when reading a passage helped me understand the science better than listening to it. But Mazur is a very talented voice artist, and she really did a magnificent job.
5*****
Subtitle: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race
This is an engaging, interesting, informative, and thought-provoking biography cum history. While the focus is on Jennifer Doudna, Isaacson gives almost equal time to the many other researchers who contributed to the scientific discoveries and applications.
The book starts out with basic biographical background, moves into the excitement of discovery and the international race to obtain patents, and to publish first, then on to ethical questions surrounding the application of new technologies, and finally focuses on the ways that these teams of scientists worked to address COVID19.
Isaacson frequently puts himself into the narrative, writing in first person about his encounters and reactions.
The audiobook is narrated by Kathe Mazur, with an introduction and epilogue narrated by Isaacson. I was happy that I had the text handy because there are times when reading a passage helped me understand the science better than listening to it. But Mazur is a very talented voice artist, and she really did a magnificent job.
June 7, 2021
'"We decant our babies as socialized human beings, as Alphas or Epsilons, as future sewage workers or future..." He was going to say "future World controllers," but correcting himself, said "future Directors of Hatcheries."' - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (as quoted in The Code Breaker)
It's been fourteen long, isolating months since my family and I have been in the perpetual Groundhog Day that is Coronavirus lockdown. We haven't hugged our families, there have been no birthday parties in the backyard, no friends over to play. But we have kept the roof over our heads, our bellies are full, and we fiercely love each other - possibly more now than ever before - as we continue to forge our path through this crazy labyrinth of plague and despair. It is the journey through said maze that has led me to The Code Breaker, as I try to understand what direction is best chosen for my family.
I have never been against vaccination, and can safely say that everyone in my house is fully immunized for all the standard diseases. That said, after having heard that there was a new type of technology being used for the Corona shots, a type of injection that would change my DNA and insert a microchip in my body (Whoa!), I was quick to put on the brakes. I then pondered that it may be time to delete a few of my YouTube subscriptions.
To be clear, I don't have a tendency to get my science from conspiracy hypotheses, memes, or my friend Sarah who flunked out of grade eleven biology; I like to make informed decisions. Not to knock Sarah, though, because I have no postsecondary science knowledge to draw on myself. I do, however, like to read, so I thought the best place to start would be to try and understand what the mRNA vaccines were about. I can somewhat confidently say that after having read about the revolutionary CRISPR technology, and Jennifer Doudna and her colleagues' discoveries in Walter Isaacson's extremely thought-provoking and enlightening book, I am not going to win any Nobel prize for scientific comprehension, but I think I have a handle on the basics. I'm essentially saying that I no longer feel like the machines are trying to take over... at least not yet.
This almost 500-page book was not like reading a textbook, where if you aren't passionate about the subject, it just drones on and you have to pry your eyelids open with your fingers - or maybe that was just me in college, but I digress. Not only a story about the fascinating life of Doudna, and the crazy ride through competition and innovation that she and her collaborators and opponents lived through over the past few decades, we are also invited to question how we feel about these new frontiers that humanity is being dragged into with the advent of somatic and germline gene editing.
From the first chapter, I had an emotional connection to the story, as I felt grateful that Doudna had the internal fortitude not to listen to the many teachers who in various different ways insisted that "Girls don't do science." She shares that at the time it was hurtful to her, but it also stiffened her resolve and caused her to focus on her goals. She remembered telling herself "I will show you. If I want to do science, I am going to do it."
Doudna, under the tutelage of Jack Szostak, was a pioneer in the research of RNA as a major player in the origins of life, monstrously widening the scope from how it had once been considered a dull intermediary to the proteins doing the lion's share of the work in human cells. Ever the valorous adventurer, she gave into curiosity and took the risk of doing her doctoral research in this ground-breaking area of study, while other biochemists were choosing to focus on the sequencing research for DNA with regard to The Human Genome Project.
She credits Jack for sharing his guiding principle: Never do something that a thousand other people are doing. She said, "I learned from Jack that there was more of a risk but also more of a reward if you ventured into a new arena."
In 1989 Doudna received her PhD from Harvard. She then went on to do her postdoctoral studies in Colorado, with Tom Chech, a man that she both respected and admired, namely for his discovery of self-splicing introns, and for leading the very best RNA biochemistry lab, at the time.
On the heels of Doudna and her future husband - then workmate in Chech’s lab - Jamie Cate, unveiling their grand discovery of the three-dimensional structure of RNA, she suffered the news that she would lose her father to melanoma. Sadly, the cancer had metastasized to his brain, and he was given only a short time to live. He was her biggest champion, and in the last months of his life she regaled him with the details of their massive breakthrough.
"It was only after he died that I realized how influential he was in my decision to become a scientist."
As sad as those days were for her, their groundbreaking findings were the catalyst to Doudna and her colleagues putting in place the tools that could edit genes. During a TV interview for a science news show, when explaining what the implications of such technology could be, she said, "One possibility is that we might be able to cure or treat people who have genetic defects."
As RNA discoveries continued to flourish, so did the significance and necessity such findings would have in the future of vaccines. Spanish Molecular Biologist Francis Mojica discovered palindrome-like, repeating segments of DNA, in the 90s, and ended up creating the defining acronym - CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats), which was excepted on November 21, 2001 as the appropriate moniker.
'Mojica found that bacteria with CRISPR spacer sequences seemed to be immune from infection by a virus that had the same sequence. But bacteria without the spacer did get infected. It was a pretty ingenious defense system, but there was something even cooler: it appeared to adapt to new threats. When new viruses came along, the bacteria that survived were able to incorporate some of that virus's DNA and thus create, in its progeny, an acquired immunity to that new virus. Mojica recalls being so overcome with emotion at this realization that he got tears in his eyes. The beauty of nature can sometimes do that to you.'
After marriage and the birth of their son, Doudna and Cate were both offered a professorship at UC Berkley. Part of Doudna's genius was her ability as an effective leader. The emphasis she put on assembling a team in her lab that had chemistry (pardon the pun), so that ideas would collaborate and flow instead of egos or combative competition causing objectives to be stifled, was cherished by her underlings.
'The camaraderie in the lab was not an accident: in hiring, Doudna placed as much emphasis on making sure someone was a good fit as she did assessing their research accomplishments.'
While she preferred and encouraged her team to be self-sufficient and independently driven, she still offered guidance and had a knack for asking creative questions, that lead to big ideas and new projects. She offered the right amount of challenge to inspire her team to be bold and brave in their endeavours. Her engagement in a project would increase when it came nearer to completion, as her excitement would see her wanting a competitive edge over other labs who may beat hers to a discovery.
The truly revolutionising work came when Jennifer Doudna and Martin Jinek collaborated with Emmanuelle Charpentier and Krzysztof Chylinski, as they attempted to figure out the mechanisms of the CRISPR-Cas9 enzyme. It was determined that - as Jinek informed Doudna - "Without the tracrRNA, the crRNA guide does not bind to the Cas9 enzyme." Doudna would go on to win the Nobel Prize with Charpentier in 2020, for their pioneering work in CRISPR gene editing.
'This amazing little system, it quickly became clear, had a truly momentous potential application: the crRNA guide could be modified to target any DNA sequence you might wish to cut. It was programmable. It could become an editing tool.'
The race to prove that CRISPR-Cas9 could work in human cells became fierce, and was realised in roughly six months in five different labs within the scientific community. Although, admittedly, the scientific and technical jargon became difficult to follow at times, there was often an under thread of competition and excitement that kept me reading. It almost became a sport, and I was in the stands rooting for my team to be first to the finish.
Doudna's most direct opponent in the field of CRISPR research and technology appeared to be Feng Zhang. Although healthy competition can inspire innovation and unleash creativity, I couldn't help but wonder how much ego and competitiveness had slowed progress of this very important research. They seemed to have differing skill sets, and that had they worked together in the race to turn CRISPR into a human gene-editing tool, things may have happened smoother and/or sooner. Putting a practical need for alliances aside, intellectual property disputes and competition for patents and prizes made for an interesting and sometimes even thrilling journey throughout The Code Breaker.
Somatic editing - changes that are made in targeted cells of a living patient and do not affect reproductive cells - is currently being used for gene editing, and is helping to eliminate blood disorders such as sickle cell anemia, aiding in the detection and treatment of cancer, as well as assisting in a cure for a form of congenital blindness. While it is true that I am no expert in ... well, anything really, (except maybe crochet,) I can see nothing wrong ethically with carrying out these kinds of treatments, most certainly if funding can be made available through all socioeconomic communities. With insurance companies being as lucrative as they are, is it naive of me to think that with government regulation this could be attainable? If the incidence of lengthy and expensive diseases were minimised within the population, and therefore are not bogging down the healthcare system, are expensive price tags for somatic gene editing not worth it in the long run? Or maybe pharmaceutical companies that pull in billions on the backs of said diseases would have a complaint that governments and the lobbyists couldn't ignore.
While somatic gene editing gets a pass with me until I can be convinced otherwise, germline editing - inheritable changes made through reproductive cells - on the other hand, has me in full-force hypervigilance mode. As amazing as these new heights being reached by CRISPR were, like any great technology, there is the possibility that it could be weaponised and used for nefarious reasons. This was when the book started to weigh heavy on my psyche, and I found myself putting it down to discuss the ethics with my husband. I couldn't shake the nagging feeling that these advances would be in the same vein as the splitting of the atom, or the proliferation of the internet. How does one truly feel about such important and life changing technologies that could also be the authors of the world's destruction?
'...in 2016 when James Clapper, the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, issued the agency's annual "Worldwide Threat Assessment" and it included for the first time "genome editing" as a potential weapon of mass destruction.'
Moral and ethical questions concerning the usage of genetic engineering to produce children of specific qualifications and lacking undesirable features, leaves a lot for discussion and thought. Although one may be inclined to feel that gene modification and selection is playing God and should be left to chance, another may think it cruel and unusual not to use every tool in the workbench to make sure all living beings have a fair chance at a good life. Imagine for a moment being able to eliminate schizophrenia from the gene pool.
Another important factor to consider is the ability for germline editing to further erode equality of opportunity within society. Could the expense of the technology, and differing regulatory standards in certain countries lead to genetic tourism? If you have the money, just travel to one of the countries that offer the procedure and design your genetically modified little human. How could any governing body or judicial system possibly regulate such a thing?
The thought that I kept coming back to as Isaacson was weighing out the pros and cons was what would be the dreaded possible unintended consequences... What would happen to: personal drive, empathy, humility, sense of accomplishment through grit and determination, sacrifice, tolerating discomfort, personal responsibility, or healthy living? If we don't seriously consider all that could come from this, do we deserve whatever we get? It felt as though there should have been an international referendum on this, but as documented in the case of the CRISPR twins in China – which you’ll find chronicled in the book – the cat was already out of the bag.
"Ingenuity without wisdom is dangerous."
It's hard to imagine how a gene supermarket, with price points only affordable to the already rich and privileged, would result in anything other than a super-elite class. Those unable to keep up would merely be serfs whose only existence would be to serve the master class. Bio-techno-feudalism, as it were. That is not the world I want to live in.
Doudna: "We could create a gene gap that would get wider with each new generation," she says. "If you think we face inequalities now, imagine what it would be like if society became genetically tiered along economic lines and we transcribed our financial inequality into our genetic code."
'By limiting gene edits to those that are truly "medically necessary," she says, we can make it less likely that parents could seek to "enhance" their children, which she feels is morally and socially wrong.'
Speaking of supermarkets, as an aside, one of my favourite questions laid out in the book references genetically modified food and one of its unintended consequences: 'Will we become less flavorful, like our tomatoes?' Maybe if more people are fed, and fewer left starving, the taste is less important? … If only it were that black and white.
Or check out my entire review at peachybooks.ca where you'll find a diagram explaining CRISPR technology, and pictures of the bookmark I was inspired to make after having read this fascinating book.
It's been fourteen long, isolating months since my family and I have been in the perpetual Groundhog Day that is Coronavirus lockdown. We haven't hugged our families, there have been no birthday parties in the backyard, no friends over to play. But we have kept the roof over our heads, our bellies are full, and we fiercely love each other - possibly more now than ever before - as we continue to forge our path through this crazy labyrinth of plague and despair. It is the journey through said maze that has led me to The Code Breaker, as I try to understand what direction is best chosen for my family.
I have never been against vaccination, and can safely say that everyone in my house is fully immunized for all the standard diseases. That said, after having heard that there was a new type of technology being used for the Corona shots, a type of injection that would change my DNA and insert a microchip in my body (Whoa!), I was quick to put on the brakes. I then pondered that it may be time to delete a few of my YouTube subscriptions.
To be clear, I don't have a tendency to get my science from conspiracy hypotheses, memes, or my friend Sarah who flunked out of grade eleven biology; I like to make informed decisions. Not to knock Sarah, though, because I have no postsecondary science knowledge to draw on myself. I do, however, like to read, so I thought the best place to start would be to try and understand what the mRNA vaccines were about. I can somewhat confidently say that after having read about the revolutionary CRISPR technology, and Jennifer Doudna and her colleagues' discoveries in Walter Isaacson's extremely thought-provoking and enlightening book, I am not going to win any Nobel prize for scientific comprehension, but I think I have a handle on the basics. I'm essentially saying that I no longer feel like the machines are trying to take over... at least not yet.
This almost 500-page book was not like reading a textbook, where if you aren't passionate about the subject, it just drones on and you have to pry your eyelids open with your fingers - or maybe that was just me in college, but I digress. Not only a story about the fascinating life of Doudna, and the crazy ride through competition and innovation that she and her collaborators and opponents lived through over the past few decades, we are also invited to question how we feel about these new frontiers that humanity is being dragged into with the advent of somatic and germline gene editing.
From the first chapter, I had an emotional connection to the story, as I felt grateful that Doudna had the internal fortitude not to listen to the many teachers who in various different ways insisted that "Girls don't do science." She shares that at the time it was hurtful to her, but it also stiffened her resolve and caused her to focus on her goals. She remembered telling herself "I will show you. If I want to do science, I am going to do it."
Doudna, under the tutelage of Jack Szostak, was a pioneer in the research of RNA as a major player in the origins of life, monstrously widening the scope from how it had once been considered a dull intermediary to the proteins doing the lion's share of the work in human cells. Ever the valorous adventurer, she gave into curiosity and took the risk of doing her doctoral research in this ground-breaking area of study, while other biochemists were choosing to focus on the sequencing research for DNA with regard to The Human Genome Project.
She credits Jack for sharing his guiding principle: Never do something that a thousand other people are doing. She said, "I learned from Jack that there was more of a risk but also more of a reward if you ventured into a new arena."
In 1989 Doudna received her PhD from Harvard. She then went on to do her postdoctoral studies in Colorado, with Tom Chech, a man that she both respected and admired, namely for his discovery of self-splicing introns, and for leading the very best RNA biochemistry lab, at the time.
On the heels of Doudna and her future husband - then workmate in Chech’s lab - Jamie Cate, unveiling their grand discovery of the three-dimensional structure of RNA, she suffered the news that she would lose her father to melanoma. Sadly, the cancer had metastasized to his brain, and he was given only a short time to live. He was her biggest champion, and in the last months of his life she regaled him with the details of their massive breakthrough.
"It was only after he died that I realized how influential he was in my decision to become a scientist."
As sad as those days were for her, their groundbreaking findings were the catalyst to Doudna and her colleagues putting in place the tools that could edit genes. During a TV interview for a science news show, when explaining what the implications of such technology could be, she said, "One possibility is that we might be able to cure or treat people who have genetic defects."
As RNA discoveries continued to flourish, so did the significance and necessity such findings would have in the future of vaccines. Spanish Molecular Biologist Francis Mojica discovered palindrome-like, repeating segments of DNA, in the 90s, and ended up creating the defining acronym - CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats), which was excepted on November 21, 2001 as the appropriate moniker.
'Mojica found that bacteria with CRISPR spacer sequences seemed to be immune from infection by a virus that had the same sequence. But bacteria without the spacer did get infected. It was a pretty ingenious defense system, but there was something even cooler: it appeared to adapt to new threats. When new viruses came along, the bacteria that survived were able to incorporate some of that virus's DNA and thus create, in its progeny, an acquired immunity to that new virus. Mojica recalls being so overcome with emotion at this realization that he got tears in his eyes. The beauty of nature can sometimes do that to you.'
After marriage and the birth of their son, Doudna and Cate were both offered a professorship at UC Berkley. Part of Doudna's genius was her ability as an effective leader. The emphasis she put on assembling a team in her lab that had chemistry (pardon the pun), so that ideas would collaborate and flow instead of egos or combative competition causing objectives to be stifled, was cherished by her underlings.
'The camaraderie in the lab was not an accident: in hiring, Doudna placed as much emphasis on making sure someone was a good fit as she did assessing their research accomplishments.'
While she preferred and encouraged her team to be self-sufficient and independently driven, she still offered guidance and had a knack for asking creative questions, that lead to big ideas and new projects. She offered the right amount of challenge to inspire her team to be bold and brave in their endeavours. Her engagement in a project would increase when it came nearer to completion, as her excitement would see her wanting a competitive edge over other labs who may beat hers to a discovery.
The truly revolutionising work came when Jennifer Doudna and Martin Jinek collaborated with Emmanuelle Charpentier and Krzysztof Chylinski, as they attempted to figure out the mechanisms of the CRISPR-Cas9 enzyme. It was determined that - as Jinek informed Doudna - "Without the tracrRNA, the crRNA guide does not bind to the Cas9 enzyme." Doudna would go on to win the Nobel Prize with Charpentier in 2020, for their pioneering work in CRISPR gene editing.
'This amazing little system, it quickly became clear, had a truly momentous potential application: the crRNA guide could be modified to target any DNA sequence you might wish to cut. It was programmable. It could become an editing tool.'
The race to prove that CRISPR-Cas9 could work in human cells became fierce, and was realised in roughly six months in five different labs within the scientific community. Although, admittedly, the scientific and technical jargon became difficult to follow at times, there was often an under thread of competition and excitement that kept me reading. It almost became a sport, and I was in the stands rooting for my team to be first to the finish.
Doudna's most direct opponent in the field of CRISPR research and technology appeared to be Feng Zhang. Although healthy competition can inspire innovation and unleash creativity, I couldn't help but wonder how much ego and competitiveness had slowed progress of this very important research. They seemed to have differing skill sets, and that had they worked together in the race to turn CRISPR into a human gene-editing tool, things may have happened smoother and/or sooner. Putting a practical need for alliances aside, intellectual property disputes and competition for patents and prizes made for an interesting and sometimes even thrilling journey throughout The Code Breaker.
Somatic editing - changes that are made in targeted cells of a living patient and do not affect reproductive cells - is currently being used for gene editing, and is helping to eliminate blood disorders such as sickle cell anemia, aiding in the detection and treatment of cancer, as well as assisting in a cure for a form of congenital blindness. While it is true that I am no expert in ... well, anything really, (except maybe crochet,) I can see nothing wrong ethically with carrying out these kinds of treatments, most certainly if funding can be made available through all socioeconomic communities. With insurance companies being as lucrative as they are, is it naive of me to think that with government regulation this could be attainable? If the incidence of lengthy and expensive diseases were minimised within the population, and therefore are not bogging down the healthcare system, are expensive price tags for somatic gene editing not worth it in the long run? Or maybe pharmaceutical companies that pull in billions on the backs of said diseases would have a complaint that governments and the lobbyists couldn't ignore.
While somatic gene editing gets a pass with me until I can be convinced otherwise, germline editing - inheritable changes made through reproductive cells - on the other hand, has me in full-force hypervigilance mode. As amazing as these new heights being reached by CRISPR were, like any great technology, there is the possibility that it could be weaponised and used for nefarious reasons. This was when the book started to weigh heavy on my psyche, and I found myself putting it down to discuss the ethics with my husband. I couldn't shake the nagging feeling that these advances would be in the same vein as the splitting of the atom, or the proliferation of the internet. How does one truly feel about such important and life changing technologies that could also be the authors of the world's destruction?
'...in 2016 when James Clapper, the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, issued the agency's annual "Worldwide Threat Assessment" and it included for the first time "genome editing" as a potential weapon of mass destruction.'
Moral and ethical questions concerning the usage of genetic engineering to produce children of specific qualifications and lacking undesirable features, leaves a lot for discussion and thought. Although one may be inclined to feel that gene modification and selection is playing God and should be left to chance, another may think it cruel and unusual not to use every tool in the workbench to make sure all living beings have a fair chance at a good life. Imagine for a moment being able to eliminate schizophrenia from the gene pool.
Another important factor to consider is the ability for germline editing to further erode equality of opportunity within society. Could the expense of the technology, and differing regulatory standards in certain countries lead to genetic tourism? If you have the money, just travel to one of the countries that offer the procedure and design your genetically modified little human. How could any governing body or judicial system possibly regulate such a thing?
The thought that I kept coming back to as Isaacson was weighing out the pros and cons was what would be the dreaded possible unintended consequences... What would happen to: personal drive, empathy, humility, sense of accomplishment through grit and determination, sacrifice, tolerating discomfort, personal responsibility, or healthy living? If we don't seriously consider all that could come from this, do we deserve whatever we get? It felt as though there should have been an international referendum on this, but as documented in the case of the CRISPR twins in China – which you’ll find chronicled in the book – the cat was already out of the bag.
"Ingenuity without wisdom is dangerous."
It's hard to imagine how a gene supermarket, with price points only affordable to the already rich and privileged, would result in anything other than a super-elite class. Those unable to keep up would merely be serfs whose only existence would be to serve the master class. Bio-techno-feudalism, as it were. That is not the world I want to live in.
Doudna: "We could create a gene gap that would get wider with each new generation," she says. "If you think we face inequalities now, imagine what it would be like if society became genetically tiered along economic lines and we transcribed our financial inequality into our genetic code."
'By limiting gene edits to those that are truly "medically necessary," she says, we can make it less likely that parents could seek to "enhance" their children, which she feels is morally and socially wrong.'
Speaking of supermarkets, as an aside, one of my favourite questions laid out in the book references genetically modified food and one of its unintended consequences: 'Will we become less flavorful, like our tomatoes?' Maybe if more people are fed, and fewer left starving, the taste is less important? … If only it were that black and white.
**REVIEW CONCLUDED IN COMMENTS**
Or check out my entire review at peachybooks.ca where you'll find a diagram explaining CRISPR technology, and pictures of the bookmark I was inspired to make after having read this fascinating book.
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