Episode description

Let's talk robots.

But first: There’s a very particular bottleneck where groundbreaking science is more applicable than ever but inaccessible to many. 

The tools are unaffordable to the schools and groups who could use them to hook kids right when they’re most excited, kids with a huge variety of lived experienced, who have grown up in the climate era, and in the COVID era, who see and want to solve problems they can touch and feel – but because of costs and access, they never get to try.

Or the bottleneck presents as being frustratingly inefficient, to the labs who actually do this stuff every day, the ones who see a peer’s research and try to replicate it, but don’t have the funding or people or bandwidth or all three to spend time filling test tubes.

Building better processes isn’t the sexiest science you can do, but the science doesn’t happen, or nearly enough of it, or fast enough, without the help of someone who’s been affected by these inefficiencies.

Someone who can see the whole journey and identify areas where existing ways of doing things and tools for doing things can be made more reliable, more useful, and more affordable, to more people.

Enter: automated synthetic biology. Or, robots!

Roya Amini-Naieni is my guest today, straight from her robot lab.

This is another in our series of conversations with 776 fellows, a two-year program for young people who want to build a better future.

Roya is not only a 776 fellow but also the co-founder and CEO of TriloBio, where she’s working on revolutionizing synthetic biology by changing the way synthetic biologists do science.

Roya’s had an incredible journey so far, the child of Iranian immigrants, the child of engineers, and the apprentice to so many mentors who have seen her ambition and seem to understand that Roya has identified a way to stand up for better access to the tools of the future, and along the way, maybe even put a dent in the universe.

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INI Book Club:

• The Mom Test by Rob Fitzpatick
• The Worm Webseries
• Find all of our guest recommendations at the INI Book Club: https://bookshop.org/lists/important-not-important-book-club

Links:

• Learn more about TriloBio on the website, LinkedIn, or Twitter
• Follow Roya on Twitter
• Learn more about the 776 Foundation Fellowship Program
• Find your