Mendelspod Podcast

In this episode of Mendelspod, Theral sits down with Rob Neely, co-founder and CSO at Tagomics, to discuss how his company is fusing genomics, epigenomics, and fragmentomics into a single, assumption-free assay for early cancer detection. The conversation begins with breaking news: Tagomics has just received a new grant from the UK’s Innovatio...

In this premium episode of Mendelspod, we’re joined by one of the few people speaking clearly and globally about biosecurity in the era of synthetic biology and AI: Sophie Peresson.

A consultant and leader in responsible innovation, Sophie brings an unusually broad and grounded perspective. With experience spanning international law and governa...

As artificial intelligence continues to influence the life sciences, some researchers are questioning not just what it can predict, but what it can explain. On this episode, Mike Kiebish, VP of Platform and Translational Sciences at BPGbio, discusses the company’s “biology-first” approach to drug discovery—one that begins not with models or li...

In this episode of Mendelspod, we plunge into the shape-shifting world of RNA with Dr. Gavin Knott, associate professor at Monash University and alum of Jennifer Doudna’s lab. Knott is part of a new generation of researchers setting structural biology ablaze with AI, decoding RNA-guided systems and expanding the CRISPR toolbox far beyond its original scope.

Knott introduces the listener to RNA not just as code, but as living languag...

For decades, drug discovery has followed two main roads: small molecules that can slip into cells but often lack precision, and biologics that offer specificity but struggle with delivery and manufacturing. In this episode, Christian Schafmeister introduces us to a third path: spiroligomers—synthetic, fused-ring molecules designed to combine t...

What if drug design didn’t depend on pre-existing biological data?

In this episode of Mendelspod, Theral sits down with Aridni Shah, co-founder and CEO of Immunito AI, a Bengaluru-based biotech startup reinventing how we develop antibody therapies. Shah and her team are using artificial intelligence to design antibodies from scratch, bypassing traditional animal-based and data-heavy methods. “We no longer need to rely on pre-existi...

Yes, the Trump economy has been tough on life science tools—but according to today’s guest, the business model was failing us anyway. It’s time to go back to rethinking the basics.

Today we’re joined by Stephane Budel, founding partner at DeciBio, one of the leading market research and consulting firms focused on life science tools and precisio...

On today’s episode of Mendelspod, Theral sits down with Giovanna Prout, CEO of Scale Biosciences, to explore a how the company is achieving new orders of magnitude of scale in the single cell space.

"In the past, single cell was one cell per well—maybe 96 cells per experiment," Prout explains. "Now, with our Quantum Scale platform, we can scal...

What if you could step inside a molecule? On today’s episode of Mendelspod, we talk with Steve McCloskey, founder and CEO of Nanome, the company bringing virtual reality into the world of drug discovery and molecular modeling. A former nanoengineering student at UC San Diego and a self-described futurist, Steve founded Nanome to create what he calls the "ultimate scientific interface"—a way for scientists not just to visualize mole...

Wait! What? Sequencing as a service?

That was the reaction when Mark Budde first set out to upend a basic ritual in molecular biology—confirmation Sanger sequencing—with his company Plasmidsaurus. You’ve heard it many times: Illumina machines sequence around 80% of the bases in the world. But as Mark points out in today’s interview, it’s not...

Just weeks before the FDA’s sweeping rule to regulate laboratory-developed tests (LDTs) was set to take effect, a federal court struck it down. What does this mean for the field of precision medicine and for labs themselves? There are have been those on the side of regulation arguing its importance for reimbursement. Yet many, such as the plaintiffs in this case, the ACLA and AMP, have argued that FDA regulation could stifle inno...

In today’s show, Theral is joined by Chris Petersen, Chief Technology Officer at Scientist.com, a company sometimes called the "Amazon for science"—though with a great deal more complexity. Chris pulls back the curtain on how AI is transforming the research services marketplace and offers a rare look into how AI is already reshaping the infrastructure of pharma and biotech.

Calling this the "tinkering phase" of AI, Chris likens the ...

In today’s program, we continue our series on disease subtyping with Dr. Jeffery Klco, a pediatric pathologist and researcher at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Dr. Klco joins us to discuss groundbreaking work recently published in Nature Genetics, which redefines the genomic landscape of childhood acute myeloid leukemia (AML).

Klco and his team have identified twelve novel molecular subtypes of pediatric AML—some driven by g...

Dr. Aaron Viny, oncologist and researcher at Columbia University, begins today’s conversation with a personal milestone—he’s now been leukemia-free for 21 years. This experience gives his work on cancer a powerful human dimension that comes through in his interview with Theral today—not only in his dedication to patient care, but in his boundary-pushing research on the epigenetic roots of cancer.

Dr. Viny’s research focuses on the e...

We’re happy to welcome back Ben Busby, Principal Scientist at DNAnexus, to dive deeper into the evolving world of disease subtyping and multi-omic data sets. Building on our previous conversation with Busby about the genomic data ecosystem, we explore the shift from single-cause disease models to multifaceted approaches that incorporate genomics, proteomics, imaging, and more.

"We’re no longer in a world where we’re doing genomics o...

John Cumbers, founder of SynBioBeta, joins Theral for our annual look ahead at the field of synthetic biology and the upcoming SynBioBeta 2025 conference, happening May 6–9 in San Jose. It's obviously a big year for AI, and synthetic biology is no exception. As John puts it, “Biology and AI coming together represents a huge opportunity for us to be able to understand biology and then ultimately engineer biology.” This year’s confer...

Today Theral is joined by returning guests Chris Mason of Weill Cornell Medicine and Simon Fredriksson, CEO of Pixelgen Technologies, for a deep dive into the emerging field of cell surface proteomics and its power to illuminate both space biology and cancer research.

Chris Mason shares new insights from his work on the Space Omics and Medical Atlas (SOMA), the largest collection of astronaut health data to date. His latest findings...

In our last episode, we explored the growing shift from genomics to multi-omics. But for Pacific Biosciences CEO Christian Henry, the foundation of discovery remains clear: “DNA is still where it’s at.” PacBio is doubling down on long-read sequencing, committed to delivering on its promise of accuracy and completeness.

2024 marks a “watershed year” for PacBio, with the launch of the Vega system—a benchtop long-read sequencer at an...

It’s time for our annual deep dive into sequencing—no, wait—multi-omics! Back on the show is our resident sequencing guru, Keith Robison, scientist at Ginkgo Bioworks and author of the OmicsOmics blog. Keith is our all time return champion, and as always, he brings technical experience alongside the storytelling instincts of a seasoned journal...