Michael Retchin

@fjeg1987 @owl_posting Seconded

@owl_posting I enjoy it. Please continue destroying yourself.

happy two year anniversary to owlposting.com it is simultaneously the highest-EV and also worst thing ive ever started in my life. the pro of online writing is that ive made a lot of friends due to it, and the con is that the psychic tax of maintaining it is bizarrely high for what ostensibly is a little essay every few weeks. i strongly suspect that nobody who regularly writes online has a baseline emotion state that is envious. if i had to do it all over again, im not sure i would, but im still happy i did. it's kind of like having an extremely annoying child

Fast Biology Bounties close this Sunday at midnight. So far, we've given away about $8,000, and expect to give about $15,000 by the end. Please send in your ideas to speed up wet-lab biology! A couple paragraphs are sufficient.

@armandcognetta Congrats!

Announcing General Proximity's $12M, 2x over-subscribed, pre-Series A round. Medicine is in the dark ages. Our understanding of biology far exceeds our ability to perturb it therapeutically.

@beckypferdehirt @AsteraInstitute Congrats!

Big news! I’m joining @AsteraInstitute as CEO of Radial, their new life sciences division. How we fund, do, and build upon science has long needed an update. At Radial, we design, fund, and operate programs that tackle foundational scientific problems while simultaneously testing better ways to do science.

@srikosuri @rhomsany Congrats!

First in Human! When @rhomsany and I first started Octant, this was the dream. A platform that makes molecules that few others can go after… to get the chance to tackle severe diseases with poor to no standard of care. It's been a long journey but so incredibly proud of the team and thankful to the volunteers who make this attempt possible. We got to celebrate with these new sunhats! octant.bio/news/octant-an…

A 10-minute application for $100,000. A free, no-strings-attached prize for builders, scientists, operators. Introducing the Eigenprize. ↓ run by @menemazarakis, @markkhrapko, & yours truly :)

If you’re an entrepreneur or operator in NYC or LA, working on your next company, Marathon (@MarathonMP) offers free space (including offices!) for you and your cofounder (and your early team!) to work out of. We’ve already had two companies start out of here in the past few months. Prime locations, with a stellar group of folks already working out of them. Pls message us if you’re interested - we would love to be your inception space! Cc: @ChaseAPackard @AlexGorgoni @MBGilroy

Announcing "Fast Biology Bounties." I'm giving away $10,000 for ideas to speed up or reduce costs for wet-lab experiments. I'm looking for ideas that are highly original and technically tractable. A couple paragraphs will suffice. Supported by Astera Institute. Details below.

While I can't quite reveal what we're cooking up at Retro just yet, we’re on the hunt for more world-class genomics scientists! Come help us build technologies that directly measure mechanisms of aging and train models to engineer rejuvenation therapies - posting below

A reminder that applications close Friday, Feb 27 for the Arc AIxBio Fellows Program. Undergrads: propose and run your own AI + biology research project over 6–12 months, with mentorship from Arc scientists. Apply solo or as a team of 2–3. arcinstitute.org/programs/aixbi…

What's the equivalent of the coding test for hiring in biology? Talking through previous research seems common but could result in false negatives among folks without meaningful past experience but nonetheless great

i am writing a biosecurity article. specifically about the startups in this space, DNA screening, and bioterrorism defenses please reach out to me if you have strong (informed!) opinions on any of these topics, i would love to talk to you!

@mnemeth101 @ScienceMagazine Congrats!!

Directed evolution revolutionized protein engineering, but still requires lots of time, iteration, and cost. Today in @ScienceMagazine we share MULTI-evolve: our lab-in-the-loop approach with thoughtful integration of modern ML to make jumps across the fitness landscape.

Freedom to Build What Matters The first glimmers of AGI are here. Whatever you can dream of, you can build. The efforts of a single individual have never mattered more. A single person, an idea, and a late night in the lab might be what changes a field. And yet the outputs of such extraordinary power have mostly been disappointing. We are using the most important technology in history to create addictive short-form video, AI girlfriends, and better ad targeting. Now is the time to do the work that will define this era. We can cure disease, feed a continent, or make humanity multi-planetary. What you choose to work on now may be the most consequential decision of your career. We built the Encode: AI for Science Fellowship for people who feel that weight. One year of salary, plenty of compute, and direct access to frontier labs, data, and domain experts across biomaterials, atmospheric science, neuromodulation, robotics, and more. No equity, no strings attached — just the freedom to explore. We've partnered with ARIA and the UK's leading research universities to make it possible. Applications close March 28th.

Personal update: I moved to the Bay Area to join @AsteraInstitute as an independent fellow. I'll spend my time writing weekly essays, researching, hosting dinners, starting a podcast, finishing my book, etc. Please invite me to things!

After a hiatus, I’m resuming mentoring calls! Happy to talk to people at any stage for career advice. Also interested in talking with people about how they feel about AI and its impact on the research enterprise. Email me and we will find a time.

Excited to share an internship opening in Regev Lab Genentech! 🧬 We’re looking for a PhD intern to work at the frontier of Bayesian Optim and LLMs for high-throughput genomics. Co-advised by Edward de Brouwer and me in SF. RT like there is no tomorrow ! (is there ?) Link below.

how can we generate more human data? - scale our current trials: 2X is plausible, but patient & care bottlenecks make 10X unlikely even with lower costs - use fewer patients/trial: better endpoints & technology can reduce the {$,patient,time}/trial - test >1 drug/patient: one pooled testing trial could generate more data on more drugs than all other trials combined

richard hamming asked colleagues: what are the most important problems in your field? few answers have the potential to benefit humanity for generations inventing medicines & 3 problems in the field - target discovery, delivery, & human data throughput - are one such answer.