Intersecting Paths: Uniting Moore's Law and Biology Through Bioconvergence
Nina Siragusa
Chief of Staff to Dr. Laura Matz, the Chief Science and Technology Officer
Merck KGaA
Abstract
Intersecting Paths: Uniting Moore's Law and Biology Through Bioconvergence For more than 4 billion years, nature has been perfecting its biological systems, developing solutions that scientists and engineers are just beginning to grasp and utilize. Leveraging synthetic biology, a myriad of applications - ranging from antibiotic development to laundry detergent enzymes, even to DNA data storage - have come to fruition. Biological systems inherently possess the ability to self-assemble, self-repair, and self-replicate. This gives them an edge that critically affects capacity, precision, and cost-efficiency, metrics highly relevant in the material science as well as manufacturing process. Recent technological developments allow us to read (sequence) and write (synthesize) DNA with greater ease and accuracy. This exponential advancement in our ability to 'program' DNA propels a technological revolution mirroring the computer surge of the 20th century and impacting manufacturing on a scale reminiscent of the 19th-century industrial revolution. In the domain of synthetic biology, two fundamental design principles particularly stand out - the concept of reusable parts and the engineering design cycle. The engineering design cycle, also applied in the semiconductor industry, simplifies the engineering process into three stages: design, build, and test. This structure's ability to scale exponentially implies that we are now able to function within the framework of Moore's Law. This principle, established in computer manufacturing, indicates that capacity successfully doubles approximately every 2 years over extensive periods. Moore's Law's relentless pace has become the benchmark for significant, long-term industrial progress. This pace is now attainable in gene synthesis. As we transition from conventional manufacturing to 'smart' manufacturing, we are harnessing the incredible compute power that Moore’s Law has provided for image and pattern recognition and massive data set analysis to drive manufacturing efficiency.
Biography
Dr. Nina Siragusa is the Chief of Staff to Dr. Laura Matz, the Chief Science and Technology Officer at Merck. As part of the Science and Technology Office Leadership Team, Nina is responsible for enabling and driving cross-sectoral collaboration, innovation strategy and digitalization at Merck across the 3 business sectors. She is leading the strategic efforts on Bioconvergence. As part of her MBA studies on Digital Transformation Management at the Goethe Business School, Frankfurt Germany, Nina is leading a project within the Group Smart Manufacturing Program.Prior to becoming Chief of Staff, Nina has been driving corporate innovation as Biotechnology Lead of a synthetic biology innovation project, Senior Manager responsible for the creation of strategic alignment as well as building and management of high performing teams and finally as Associate Director responsible for targeted sourcing of innovative ideas, with the goal to generate new businesses.Nina has a PhD in Biology from the University of Tuebingen, Germany. She has worked as a researcher in Europe and the USA at Yale University prior to joining Merck KGaA, Darmstadt Germany in 2016.
