Some Important Milestones in the Superconverging Revolutions
1590
Dutch eyeglass-maker Zacharias Janssen invents the first microscope
1665
Robert Hooke refines the microscope to the point where he can observe structures he calls “cells” in biological samples, a reference to the rooms in cramped monasteries
1675
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek uses his improved microscope to discover protozoa and bacteria
1796
Edward Jenner introduces first modern vaccine, for smallpox
1821
The first computer, Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine, conceived but never fully built
1848
British mathematician Ada Lovelace writes the world’s first computer code
1859
Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection
First commercial oil well drilled in Titusville, Pennsylvania
1865
Gregor Mendel publishes “Experiments on Plant Hybrids,” outlining the transmission of hereditary traits, in peas in the obscure journal, Verhandlungen des naturforschenden Vereines in Brünn. Few read it.
1869
Frederick Miescher isolates acid from the nuclei of cells, calling it “nuclein”
1879
Walter Flemming outlines the role of chromosomes in cell division
1900
Work of Gregor Mendel independently rediscovered and popularized by two groups of botanists exploring plant heredity
1907
Leo Baekland produces world’s first synthetic plastic
1909
The word “gene,” outlining a unit of heredity, coined by Danish botanist Wilhelm Johannsen
1911
Columbia University’s Thomas Hunt Morgan proves that chromosomes carry genes to pass hereditary information to future generations
1912
The term “synthetic biology” coined by French biologist Stephane Leduc
1919
Hungarian Karoly Ereky invents the term “biotechnology”
1928
Capacity for X-rays and radioactive radium to mutate barley and other plants described
1931
MIT engineer Vannevar Bush invents the first general-purpose analog computer, the Differential Analyzer
1936
Alan Turing proposes and outlines a “universal computing machine”
1940
German Enigma machine decoded by scientists at Bletchley Park, UK
1942
Penicillin mass produced in microbes, providing a significant boost to the Allied war effort
1943
First image captured of X-ray diffraction of DNA provides clues of DNA organizational structure
Warren McCulloch and Walter Pitts conceptualize model of neural network computing in seminal Bulletin of Mathematical Biophysics paper
1950
Alan Turing introduces the idea of the “Turing test” for machine intelligence
First synthetic antibiotic created
1952
Alfred Hershey and Martha Chase prove that genes are made of DNA
1953
Watson and Crick (plus Franklin and Wilkins) describe the double helix structure of DNA
1955
Dartmouth professor John McCarthy coins the term “Artificial Intelligence”
Jonas Salk develops first polio vaccine
1956
McCarthy organizes summer “Artificial Intelligence” hackathon
1957
First commercial irradiation of crops
Bell Laboratories scientists invent the transistor
Frank Rosenblatt builds Mark I computer
1958
Washington University biochemist Arthus Kornberg produces DNA in a test tube
First microchip created by US engineer Jack Kilby and others
1961
Sydney Brenner, Francois Jacob, Matthew Meselson, and Jacques Monod show that messenger RNAs take genetic information from the nucleus of cells into the cytoplasm for the generation of proteins
Jacob and Monod publish seminal papers describing cellular circuits in bacterial cells regulating genetic activity and envisioning the engineered manipulation of these mechanisms
1965
MIT’s Joseph Weizenbaum creates world’s first chatbot, Eliza
1966
Multiple scientists prove that DNA is made of four bases, adenine (A), cytosine (C), guanine (G), and thymine (T), which determine the order of twenty different amino acids making up proteins
1969
US Defense Department introduces DARPANET, the first internet
Marvin Minsky and Seymour Papert publish Perceptron, an influential book on AI
1970
Restriction enzymes used to cut DNA identified in bacteria
Norman Borlaug wins Nobel Prize for decades of work with colleagues helping launch the Green Revolution
1971
Paul Berg slices genetic materials from one type of virus to another, launching the field of recombinant DNA
1972
Cohen and Boyer invent a way to clone genetically engineered molecules in non-native cells
1973
First animal gene cloned
1975
Two different scientific groups develop first semi-automated DNA sequencing
Asilomar conference explores implications of recombinant DNA
1976
Biotech company Genentech founded to create recombinant DNA drugs
1977
IBM’s Deep Blue computer defeats world grandmaster Garry Kasparov at chess
1978
Louse Brown, the first “test tube baby,” born in the UK
Boyer lab creates first synthetic insulin
1980
US Supreme Court upholds first patent on a re-engineered living organisms, in this case a bacteria
Smallpox officially eradicated after two-decade vaccination campaign
1981
First transgenic fruit flies and mice created, making it possible for scientists to more effectively evaluate the impact of induced genetic mutations
1982
Genentech insulin generated from engineered bacteria approved by FDA and hits the market
First transgenic plant introduced, an antibiotic-resistant tobacco plant
1983
The first disease-causing single gene mutation is identified, for Huntington’s disease
The polymerase chain reaction, PCR, process is developed, making it possible to amplify DNA at scale
First artificial chromosome synthesized
1987
M.S. Swaminathan receives inaugural World Food Prize for developing high-yield wheat and rice varieties and bringing Green Revolution to India
1989
British researcher Tim Berners-Lee proposes model for what would become the World Wide Web
1990
Human Genome Project launched
First successful gene therapy procedure carried out at America’s NIH
1994
America’s FDA approves its first genetically modified food, FLAVR SAVR tomatoes
1995
Genetically modified corn and soybeans approved for sale in the United States
1996
Dolly the cloned sheep born in Edinburgh, UK
1997
E. coli genome sequenced and soon becomes a workhorse of laboratory and industry research and applications
1998
C. elegans roundworm sequenced, providing an ideal “model organisms” for genetics research
Pest-resistant, genetically modified Bt corn produced
First quantum computer introduced
1999
Nvidia calls its GeForce 256 chip the world’s first graphics processing unit (GPU)
2000
First synthetic gene circuits able to carry out targeted functions are designed
First entire plant genome sequenced, for a mustard weed
2003
Human Genome Project completed
Thomes Knight introduces the concept of “biobricks,” easily assemble biological Legos
Craig Venter announces creation of the first synthetic virus
First Intercollegiate Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition held at MIT
2008
Craig Venter and colleagues announce first viable bacterial cell regulated by a chemically synthesized genome
2011
Controversy emerges after scientist in the Netherlands, America, and Japan manipulate H5N1 viruses making them more dangerous to humans
IBM Watson wins the US gameshow, Jeopardy
2012
Multiple authors, including Emmanuel Charpentier, George Church, Jennifer Doudna, and Feng Zhang publish papers outlining CRISPR genome editing
Shinya Yamanaka wins Nobel Prize for development of induced pluripotent stem cells
2013
Mark Post creates first cell-cultured hamburger
Large-scale production of malaria drug artemisinin using tools of synthetic biology
2014
Amazon Alexa introduced
Fully functional yeast chromosome synthesized
2015
FDA approves application for commercial development of first genetically modified animal product, genetically modified salmon
Geoff Hinton and colleagues win ImageNet competition, highlighting the potential of neural network computing
2016
Google DeepMind’s AlphaGo defeats Go champion Lee Seedol in Seoul, Korea
2017
Google DeepMind AlphaZero defeats AlphaGo after three days of learning Go by playing against itself
Google Brain researchers release seminal paper, “Attention is All You Need,” describing transformer model for neural network computing
First blood stem cells grown in Boston laboratory
2018
First human “CRISPR babies” born in China
2019
SARS-CoV-2 virus begins spreading in humans, very possibly stemming from a research-related incident in Wuhan
2020
Google DeepMind AlphaFold becomes able to predict protein shapes from amino acid sequences alone, essentially solving the “protein folding problem”
COVID-19 mRNA vaccines developed in an astounding 11 months
First commercial sale of a cell-cultured animal product, chicken nuggets in Singapore
OpenAI launches GPT-3
2022
Google DeepMind and European Molecular Biology Laboratory release protein shape predictions for 214 million proteins, almost all proteins known to science
ChatGPT released by OpenAI and quickly becomes the fastest growing computer application in history
2023
Global AI arms race begins
First (acknowledged) exascale computer made accessible to researchers at America’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory
CRISPR-based gene therapy for sickle cell disease approved by regulators in the UK and US
US congressional hearings on COVID-19 origins begin
2024
Google DeepMind introduced AlphaGeometry, an AI system able to solve problems of the International Mathematical Olympiad at roughly the same level as the average human gold medalists
Google, OpenAI, and others release multimodal AI systems able to analyze and generate text, images, and videos within the same systems
Jamie Metzl publishes Superconvergence: How the Genetics, Biotech, and AI Revolutions Will Transform our Lives, Work, and World
(NOTE: This is an incomplete and imperfect list. Please let me know if anything essential is missing.)