From breakthroughs to biosolutions: How biology is changing the world

Biosolutions are all about solving problems with biology — the study of all living things. And right now, humanity has reached a point where we not only study life but also learn directly from it.  With centuries of discovery and the rise of powerful new technologies, we are beginning to turn nature’s own strategies into solutions for challenges in health, food, and the environment. This is the story of how humans, step by step, have developed this capacity — from the first glimpses of cells under a microscope to today’s ability to design biosolutions inspired by life itself. 

This audio article is part of The Biosolutions Bulletin. For the text version of this article and to get The Biosolutions Bulletin delivered monthly directly to your inbox, please go to: https://www.novonesis.com/en/biosolutions-bulletin

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From breakthroughs to biosolutions: How biology is changing the world 

Biosolutions are all about solving problems with biology — the study of all living things. And right now, humanity has reached a point where we not only study life but also learn directly from it.  With centuries of discovery and the rise of powerful new technologies, we are beginning to turn nature’s own strategies into solutions for challenges in health, food, and the environment. 

In this episode of the Biosolutions Bulletin by Novonesis, you will learn how humans step by step how humans, step by step, have developed this capacity — from the first glimpses of cells under a microscope to today’s ability to design biosolutions inspired by life itself. 

Over 150 years ago, the British ship HMS Challenger set sail with six scientists and a crew of 250 to explore the oceans. Four years and 125,000 kilometers later, their samples and observations had transformed our understanding of the seas.  

Since then, technology has taken ocean exploration far deeper — from the first Bathysphere dives in the 1930s, in spherical steel chambers, to today’s autonomous vehicles probing the Mariana Trench, the planet’s deepest oceanic canyon 11 kilometers down. These advances continue to reveal astonishing discoveries, like microbes producing “dark oxygen” in the ocean’s depths, challenging the long-held belief that photosynthesis is the only source of oxygen on Earth. 

Exploration, however, is not limited to oceans. The human body, too, is a frontier. Just as oceanographers uncover hidden depths, modern science has revealed layers of our biology invisible to the naked eye but essential to life. Peering through a simple optical microscope is no longer enough. To truly understand these hidden worlds, biology now converges with physics, chemistry, engineering, and computing.  

This article traces that journey: from the first glimpses of cells under a crude microscope to the revolutionary technologies including artificial intelligence that are reshaping our understanding of life. Together, we’ll peel back the layers, one by one, and explore the invisible world inside us. 

The first layer: The cell 

Why start with the cell? Because it was the earliest visible gateway into the hidden world of life. The very first time a cell was observed under a microscope was in 1665, when Robert Hooke examined a thin slice of cork. What he saw reminded him of the small rooms, or “cells,” in a monastery, and the name stuck. A few years later, in 1674, Anton van Leeuwenhoek took things further when he became the first to observe living cells under his handcrafted microscope. 

Yet, neither Hooke nor Leeuwenhoek understood what they were really seeing. To them, cells were simply tiny compartments, their inner life a complete mystery. It would take nearly 170 years before scientists developed cell theory in the early 19th century, declaring that all living organisms are made of cells and that the cell is the basic unit of life. Only later, in the second half of that century, did researchers begin to uncover the first clues about what actually happens inside cells. By the 1930s, with the invention of more advanced microscopes, the hidden machinery of the cell finally started to come into focus.  

So, what exactly is a cell, and why do scientists call it the “basic unit of life”? 

A cell is like a tiny, self-contained city. When many such cells come together, they form a multicellular organism — like you, me, and every plant and animal around us. And while organisms differ enormously, at the cellular level their basic architecture is remarkably similar: 

Cell membrane: The protective boundary, like city walls or gates, deciding what enters and what leaves. In plants, this is reinforced by an extra tough layer called the cell wall. 

Cytoplasm: The jelly-like substance filling the space between the cell membrane and the nucleus is like the open landscape of a city. Within it lie organelles, the cell’s miniature organs, each with specialized roles. Mitochondria are small structures that produce energy for the cell, like power plants generating electricity for a city. Ribosomes are the city’s factories, building proteins that serve as essential tools and workers, while other organelles function as roads, communication networks, and recycling centers, keeping the city organized and efficient. 

Nucleus: The city’s main library at the center, storing the master plans and blueprints, and coordinating all activities. 

Despite being incredibly small, so small that millions could fit on the head of a pin, cells are remarkably organized. They can sense changes in their environment, communicate with one another, and even repair themselves when damaged. 

But early scientists did not yet know this. To them, the cell was just a box with a nucleus inside. The true complexity of the nucleus would only be revealed with better tools. And so, our journey continues as we peel back the next layer and step into the nucleus itself: the city hall of the cell.

The second layer: The cell nucleus 

How much time do you think passed between the discovery of cells and the discovery of the rounded structure sitting at their center, the nucleus? Any guesses? 

It may surprise you: it took 166 years. In 1831, a botanist named Robert Brown, while studying orchids under his microscope, spotted a distinct central body inside the cells. He named it the nucleus. 

So, what exactly is this nucleus, and why do we compare it to the city’s main library — the place where all the master plans, blueprints, and instructions are stored and coordinated? 

The nucleus matters because tucked inside it is something extraordinary: the complete set of instructions that make up an organism, what we now call the genome. That instruction set is written in a molecule you’ve probably heard of in every crime drama: DNA. 

But the story of how DNA was discovered is anything but straightforward. In 1869, a Swiss chemist named Friedrich Miescher was studying white blood cells collected, rather unglamorously, from hospital bandages containing pus. From the nuclei of these cells, he extracted a strange substance unlike anything scientists had seen before. It was sticky, rich in phosphorus, and clearly not a protein. He named it “nuclein.” At the time, no one suspected this odd material would turn out to be the blueprint of life itself. 

For decades, nuclein sat in scientific obscurity. Few believed that this humble substance might carry the secrets of life. Then, in 1889, another scientist, Richard Altmann, took the next step. He purified the substance further and discovered that it had acidic properties. Altmann gave it a new name that would last: nucleic acid. 

And that is where the mystery stood at the end of the 19th century. Scientists knew that inside the nucleus lay a curious chemical called nucleic acid. But what was it made of? What was its role? And why was it there at all? 

Those questions would take decades more to answer — and the answers would change biology forever. 

Let's have some fun facts:

Small creatures, big genetic surprises
 
You might think humans must have far more genes than simple and smaller creatures than us, like a Fruit fly (Drosophila). But nature loves to surprise us. Humans have about 20,000–25,000 genes, whereas the fruit fly has around 16,000 genes. Even the tiny 1mm-long worm, called C. elegans contains around 20,000 genes. Gene count, it turns out, does not always equal size!  

Your DNA is 99.6% “textbook human” 

On average, your genome matches the reference human genome by about 99.6%. The remaining 0.4% represents your unique genomic variants—the tiny tweaks in your DNA that make you distinctly you. That tiny 0.4 percent difference explains why we each have unique traits, susceptibilities, and quirks. On the molecular level, humanity is far more alike than we are different.

The third layer: DNA 

The mystery of nucleic acid lingered for decades. Scientists knew it was there, locked inside the nucleus, but its true role was hidden in shadows. Slowly, in the late 1800s, the fog began to lift. A German biochemist, Albrecht Kossel, spent years dissecting the chemistry of this strange substance. His painstaking work revealed that it was not a featureless material after all but built from four distinct chemical “letters.” He named them Adenine, Thymine, Cytosine, and Guanine — A, T, C, and G. Four letters that we would eventually come to know as the script for the book of life.  

Still, no one yet knew how those letters were arranged, or what they meant. That piece of the riddle began to unfold in the 1920s, when Phoebus Levene11 made a breakthrough. He discovered that the letters did not float around alone; each was bound to a sugar and a phosphate, forming repeating units called nucleotides. Even more crucial, he realized there were two kinds of sugars: one gave rise to ribonucleic acid (RNA), and the other to deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). 

For the first time, the substance once known simply as “nuclein” now had a true identity: DNA.  

But there was still a missing piece: how could DNA actually carry information from one generation to the next? That remained a mystery — until 1953, when biology changed forever. 

Two young scientists, James Watson and Francis Crick, pieced together DNA’s shape. Crucial to their breakthrough were X-ray crystallography images captured by Rosalind Franklin, which revealed how the chemical letters were arranged12. DNA was not a simple line of A, T, C, and G strung together. Instead, it formed an elegant double helix — a twisted ladder where the bases paired across two strands. Suddenly, DNA was no longer a mysterious chemical; it had a clear structure that could be visualized. 

You might still be wondering: Why is DNA called the blueprint of life? We are almost there, but first let us take a brief detour to meet the true workhorses of life: proteins. 

Today, the word “protein” often brings to mind fitness influencers talking about shakes and diets. But in reality, proteins are the genuine building blocks of life. For example:  

Your skin, hair, muscles, and blood are made of proteins. 

The enzymes that digest your food are proteins. 

The antibodies that defend you from infection are proteins. 

Even the cell itself, that tiny city of life, is largely built and run by proteins. 

Proteins are both the raw materials and the machinery. If the cell is a city, proteins are the bricks, the cranes, the workers, and the roads all at once. 

Now you may ask: If DNA can make proteins inside our cells, why do we need to eat proteins at all? The answer lies in recycling. 

When you eat protein rich foods like chicken, eggs, lentils, or tofu, your body does not use them as they are. Instead, your digestive system breaks them down into smaller units called amino acids. Think of it like dismantling an old piece of furniture into planks of wood. Only once it is taken apart can your cells reuse the raw material. Inside your cells, those amino acids are snapped back together into brand-new proteins — but not randomly. They are assembled according to exactly what your body needs at that moment. 

Here’s another fascinating fact: your body uses just 20 types of amino acids to build every protein that makes you who you are. That is why it is so important to maintain a steady supply of amino acids through protein-rich foods. 

But how do cells know which proteins to build? Returning to our furniture analogy, planks of wood do not magically become a chair — you need an instruction manual. The same is true for proteins, and that manual is stored in your DNA. 

However, DNA is too valuable to be taken out of its vault, the nucleus. Think of it as a master book of instruction manuals for every kind of furniture (protein) that may ever be needed. Whether it is hemoglobin to carry oxygen, insulin to regulate blood sugar, collagen to hold tissues together, keratin for hair and nails, or even the proteins that made up the white blood cells Friedrich Miescher studied when he first discovered “nuclein,” the instructions are all written in DNA, encoded in sequences of A, T, C, and G. And where does this DNA come from? From your parents — which is why you resemble them. 

So how do cells actually use these instruction manuals, the genes? Whenever a protein is needed, the cell does not risk removing the master book from the nucleus. Instead, it makes a working copy of the specific gene required. This copy is written in RNA. The RNA leaves the nucleus and travels to a ribosome — the cell’s protein factory. Using amino acids from your food as raw materials, the ribosome follows the RNA’s instructions step by step, assembling a brand-new protein. 

Biologists sum up this entire flow of information, DNA → RNA → Protein, with a neat phrase: Central dogma of molecular biology. It is a grand-sounding name for a simple but profound truth: the instructions written in your DNA become the proteins that make you. 

And now the phrase “blueprint of life” makes sense. DNA is not just a molecule lying dormant in the nucleus of your trillions of cells. It is the master book of instruction manuals that tells each cell how to build the proteins that keep you alive. 

Here is the fascinating twist: more than 99 percent of your DNA is the same as every other human’s, but tiny differences in the sequence of those four chemical letters — A, T, C, and G — make you uniquely you. Those differences explain why you may inherit your father’s smile, your mother’s height, yet still remain your own person. They also explain why DNA is such a powerful tool in crime investigations: no two people (except identical twins) share the exact same DNA sequence. 

DNA does not just build life. It carries identity. It carries history. And it is the gateway to the next layer of our story: the genome. 

The fourth layer: The human genome 

As humans began peering deeper into cells and examining ever-smaller parts of the body, a bigger picture of life started to emerge. A picture so vast that it would take more than a decade and billions of dollars just to decode. And even today, we are still trying to fully understand it. 

Any idea what we are reaching for? It is the grand scheme of the living world: the genome. 

We already know that DNA is like a master book of instruction manuals, with each manual being a gene. Each gene carries directions to produce a specific protein. So, DNA is packed with thousands of genes, each tied to different proteins.  

But here is something you may not have thought about: how long is the DNA inside a single cell? Stretched out, it would be about two meters long! Of course, it cannot simply coil loosely inside the tiny nucleus. Instead, it is folded and packed into structures called chromosomes. Humans have 46 chromosomes, arranged neatly in 23 pairs. And when you put together all the DNA stored across those chromosomes, you have the genome. 

If this sounds a little abstract, let us return to our analogy. The nucleus is like a library that holds 46 volumes of books — the books of life. These volumes are arranged in 23 pairs on the shelves. Each book contains countless instruction manuals (genes), and if you combine the information across all 46, you have the full collection: the genome.  

Apart from small differences between individuals, the vast majority of the human genome is the same. But for decades, one big question remained: What does the full human genome actually look like? 

In 1990, scientists around the world took up a historic challenge: to read, for the very first time, every single letter of the human genome. This massive international collaboration, called the Human Genome Project14 (HGP), brought together more than 20 universities and research centers across the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Japan, and China. It was biology’s equivalent of the Apollo moon mission. The project lasted until 2003, cost about $3.8 billion, and transformed the life sciences forever. 

The outcome was extraordinary. For the first time, scientists had the complete sequence of the human genome. They discovered that inside each cell, the genome is written with more than 3 billion chemical letters — A, T, C, and G — arranged in precise order. Within that text, they identified over 20,000 genes, the instruction manuals that tell our cells how to build the proteins that make life possible. This process of reading the genome letter by letter came to be known as genome sequencing. 

But how do you actually read three billion letters strung across 46 books? Scientists relied on a method called Sanger sequencing. Imagine taking every page of a massive book, shredding it into countless scraps, and then tagging the end of each scrap with a brightly colored marker. Each color represented a specific letter — A, T, C, or G. By feeding these scraps into a machine equipped with lasers, scientists could detect the glowing tags and determine the sequence of letters on each fragment.  

At this stage, biology was no longer working alone. Sequencing demanded the marriage of many sciences and technologies: 

·       Optics, to detect faint flashes of colored light marking each DNA letter with precision. 

·       Engineering, to design automated sequencers capable of processing thousands of samples around the clock. 

·       Computing power, to assemble billions of fragments into a coherent sequence that made sense. 

·       High-capacity data storage, to hold the vast flood of raw information produced in every sequencing run. 

·       Mathematics and statistics, to ensure accuracy by checking overlaps, correcting errors, and validating the final sequence. 

Without computers, the Human Genome Project would have been impossible. 

Yet even with the 3 billion letters finally in hand, the challenge was far from over. It was like opening an ancient library where you could read every single character but still did not understand the language. The next step — analyzing, interpreting, and making sense of the data — relied even more heavily on computing. Biology had entered a new era, one where decoding life became inseparable from decoding information.  

By the time the Human Genome Project ended in 2003, one thing was clear: biology had crossed a threshold. From then on, the study of life would not belong to biology alone. It would be a symphony of sciences — physics, chemistry, engineering, and computing — working together. In the years that followed, this realization gained a name: bioconvergence. Coined in the mid-2000s, the term describes the merging of biology with advanced technologies, accelerating discovery in ways once unthinkable.  

If the microscope defined the 17th century, and DNA defined the 20th, then bioconvergence is shaping up to define the 21st. And at its heart lies the most talked-about technology of our era: Artificial Intelligence. 

The fifth layer: Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) 

Two centuries ago, farming was simple. You tilled the land, sowed seeds, added manure, and waited for the harvest. Today, agriculture is anything but simple. Farmers test soil quality, use biofertilizers alongside chemicals, monitor plant health, forecast the weather, fine-tune irrigation, and even study the soil microbiome. Agriculture has become a convergence of multiple sciences and technologies. 

Biology, too, has undergone the same transformation. No longer limited to microscopes and petri dishes, it now draws on optics, chemistry, computing, engineering, and artificial intelligence. This is bioconvergence in action — not just an idea, but the engine driving modern biology.  

Why does bioconvergence matter? Because it accelerates discovery. It allows us to turn floods of raw data into knowledge and insight. And perhaps no example illustrates this better than genome sequencing. 

When the Human Genome Project began in 1990, scientists relied on Sanger sequencing. It was ingenious but slow — like copying an entire library by painstakingly photocopying a few lines at a time. That is why sequencing a single human genome took 13 years and cost $3.8 billion. 

Then came Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS). Instead of reading DNA letter by letter, NGS can read millions of fragments in parallel. Imagine shredding all 46 books of life into countless scraps and scanning them simultaneously with high-speed machines. Advanced algorithms and computing power then reassemble those scraps into the original volumes. This leap from step-by-step reading to massively parallel reading was like moving from a typewriter to the internet age. 

What makes NGS possible is not just clever biochemistry but also cutting-edge technology, like powerful processors to crunch vast datasets, optical sensors to capture signals from DNA fragments, high-capacity storage to hold terabytes of sequencing data, and advanced software and AI to analyze patterns invisible to humans.  

Genome sequencing machines today generate staggering amounts of raw data — terabytes in a single run. Supercomputers and cloud platforms make it possible to process this flood of information, while AI sifts through it, spotting patterns hidden in the noise. What once demanded a global moonshot can now be done in a local lab in a matter of few days, for under $1,000, and the cost continues to fall. 

But why does this matter? Because genome sequencing is not just about reading DNA. It is about reshaping our relationship with life itself. For example:  

In healthcare, multiple genomes can be compared to uncover the genetic cause of disease, enabling truly personalized medicine. 

In agriculture, genome sequencing crops will help us design varieties that thrive in droughts, resist pests, and adapt to poor soils. 

In conservation, sequencing the genomes of endangered species preserves genetic diversity and strengthens survival efforts. Today, sequencing the genome of a tiger — once unthinkable — can be done in days, giving conservationists a powerful new tool to safeguard biodiversity. 

This is the promise of bioconvergence. By fusing biology with computing, engineering, optics, AI, and other emerging technologies, we are moving beyond observing life to inferring, predicting, and even redesigning it. We are still making sense of all the information uncovered in the Human Genome Project, but now we do so with tools capable of learning and improving alongside us. At the core of this shift is Artificial Intelligence.  

AI is no longer a distant helper on the sidelines. It has become the compass, the engine, and the interpreter of modern biology. It allows us not just to read the instruction manuals of life but to search, annotate, edit, and maybe one day, even rewrite them. The library of life is no longer a silent archive. With AI, it is becoming interactive. Each breakthrough brings not just answers but new questions, inviting us deeper into the hidden layers of life. The layers we have uncovered so far are only the beginning, and the ones still waiting to be reveled may shape a future filled with knowledge, resilience and hope. 

Thank you for listening. This audio article is part of the Biosolutions bulletin by Novonesis. For the text version of this article and to receive the monthly Biosolutions bulletin directly in your inbox, go to: https://www.novonesis.com/biosolutions-bulletin.