Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan say virtual cells could change how science takes risk, letting researchers test bold ideas in simulation before entering the wet lab. “The promise of being able to… | Andreessen Horowitz | 24 comments

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Andreessen Horowitz

594,696 followers

1d

Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan say virtual cells could change how science takes risk, letting researchers test bold ideas in simulation before entering the wet lab. “The promise of being able to do virtual biology… is you can actually take on riskier ideas.” “If you had a virtual cell model… you could actually then start testing it and tinkering on the computational side… see if there is promise doing the experiments in silico before you make the time and money investment in the wet lab.” Biohub

24 Comments

Transcript

Will build the bio hubs around grand biological challenges. The bio hubs will build tools that will generate novel data sets. We will build models based on those and then eventually combine the models into an increasingly general view of a virtual cell. That will be useful both for scientists and hopefully startups and companies that are working on finding drugs, which is not our part of the whole thing, but I think is obviously a really important part of what needs to happen. The promise of being able to do virtual biology using a virtual. The model is you can actually take on riskier ideas right now, like grant funding can be hard to come by in the wet. Lab work is expensive and slow. And it's not just, you know, money, it's also time. And so you have to choose something that you think is going to have some likelihood of success to keep your lab career going. But if you had a virtual cell model where you could simulate really high quality biology, you could actually then start testing it and tinkering on the computational. Slide and like ask riskier questions, things that would have been expensive and costly in terms of time and resources to do in the lab and actually see if there is promise doing the experiments in silico before you make the time and money investment in the wet.

Baine Childress, graphic

Baine Childress

SaaS Account Executive | Enterprise & Mid-Market AE | AI & Automation | Data & Productivity Software Sales | Top 1% Closer Driving $MM+ Revenue Through Consultative Selling | Remote U.S.

1d

This is going to be an absolute game-changer for humanity. Right now, research funding and lab time are driven by what’s most likely to work (provide ROI) not by what could most profoundly change the world. Virtual cell modeling flips that equation. Suddenly, riskier, bolder ideas not only become possible again, but they become the new frontier. If we want discoveries we’ve never seen, we have to be willing to explore paths we’ve never taken. 🔬💡

Martha Bhattacharya, graphic

Martha Bhattacharya

Associate Professor, Neuroscience, University of Arizona

1d

I do not think we have enough bench info about how cells do things to train the models to make anything right now that would be trustworthy. Cell bio can’t be understood just with transcriptional readouts, which is the thing we have in droves data-wise. Would love to know what types of data go into this, and how confident we are in it.

Andreessen Horowitz, graphic

Andreessen Horowitz

1d

Listen to the full interview here: https://youtu.be/YnV8pgHtO5Y

Micky Dulberg, graphic

Network Engineer | Software Quality | Enterprise Technical Support | Breaking software

1d

I wish we heard more conversations about how AI is transforming medicine — improving diagnostics, accelerating drug discovery, and helping doctors make better decisions — instead of just using AI agents to reorder milk when we run out. To me, that’s part of why the “AI bubble” isn’t really a bubble at all. It’s an evolving space that’s still taking shape — and its most meaningful impact will come from solving real, complex problems that truly matter. (also, why do I keep using the AI-polished version for everything I write? 🤔 )

Will Tygart, graphic

Where there’s a Will - there’s a way.

1d

Makes me wonder if all of this "Human stuff" is some other entity's version of the virtual cells. 🤔 🫣 🤖 🤙

Dr Adam Glen, graphic

CEO/Founder @Unicorn & Dragon Bio | Automated discovery and manufacturing engines for science | Building new scientific paradigms

19h

"The only thing that will teach you something new is the unexpected result". Modelling doesn't tell you the unexpected result. The way to do this is to converge hardware and modelling in real time. Thats what we have built.

SpiceOrb - Talent Hunt Experts, graphic

SpiceOrb - Talent Hunt Experts

1d

This is so informative, appreciate it!

BioPhenyx, graphic

22h

We could help validate findings from such models 😊 - at some point the hypotheses generated virtually by AI would have to meet the real world.

Alex Moffett, graphic

Siricell, Inc.

23h

The next step in developing a virtual cell should start on human Totipotent stem cells. They exist are are available now for clinical research.

Jack Buchanan-Conroy, graphic

Jack Buchanan-Conroy

Principal Engineer | Senior Contractor | TypeScript React Nextjs Nodejs | MCP & AI It’s all 0’s and 1’s

14h

Bet he didn't think he'd be saying that when he first started Facey B

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