My whole interest is, how do you use evolution as an innovation engine? How does evolution solve new problems that life faces? And to have a system that can create a whole new chemical bond that biology hasn’t done before, to me, demonstrates the power of nature to innovate. Frances Arnold Read Quote
People are really interested in these fundamental questions: Why is life based on carbon and not silicon? Frances Arnold Read Quote
Silicon-based life on Earth doesn’t make sense, but perhaps it would in some totally different environment. Frances Arnold Read Quote
Enzymes are masters of chemistry. They evolved over billions of years to perform specific biological functions. They make complex materials with virtually no waste. Frances Arnold Read Quote
My laboratory uses evolution to design new enzymes. No one really knows how to design them – they are tremendously complicated. But we are learning how to use evolution to make new ones, just as nature does. Frances Arnold Read Quote
Inside of a living cell there are thousands of proteins that enable it to make more of itself and make your malaria drug, for instance. We don’t understand those. We don’t understand how they work together. Frances Arnold Read Quote
I took mechanical drawing, geometry and typing at high school, the latter because that is what they did with smart girls in those days! Frances Arnold Read Quote
In the test tube, I can make any DNA I want, recombining it from monkeys, worms, anywhere. So I can explore new rules of breeding with molecules. Frances Arnold Read Quote
