![]() “WITHOUT GENES IN SPACE,” SHE SAID, “I SIMPLY WOULD NOT BE HERE.” ON CLEAR NIGHTS, SHE DRIVES OUT OF THE CITY, SITS ON THE HOOD OF HER CAR, LOOKS AT THE STARS AND THINKS ABOUT HER OWN TRAJECTORY. Five finalists would enjoy mentoring from Harvard and MIT scientists and would receive biotechnology toolkits for their classrooms before presenting their proposals to the Genes in Space judges at the annual ISS Research & Development Conference. The four founders decided that the contest would be open to students in grades 7-12 who would design pioneering DNA experiments for the ISS. “We turned that question around and passed it along to middle and high school students.” “Boeing saw the technology and saw the potential,” Kraves said. In 2015, Boeing and miniPCR bio collaborated to launch Genes in Space, an annual science competition focused on inspiring young minds to solve real-world problems in the biological and physical sciences. Who better to ask these big questions than teenagers? And we felt a little uncomfortable with that responsibility.”Īfter multiple brainstorming sessions about how to move forward, Kraves and Alvarez Saavedra realized they had access to a much deeper reservoir of boundless creativity than they could muster between themselves. These are incredibly big, open questions. “These are real questions-about the origins of life, whether we’re alone in the universe, what deep space exploration does to our genetic material. “We were aware of the breadth of that question,” said Kraves, who said he and Alvarez Saavedra felt intimidated thinking about how to respond to Boeing about potential areas of research. So Copeland and Foley asked the miniPCR founders for their suggestions about how the pocket-sized device would be best used in microgravity. But they weren’t sure exactly what researchers would do with the device on the space station. Copeland and Foley were intrigued by the miniPCR: This innovation was small, compact, simple to operate and used little power-perfect for the ISS. And at the time, the ISS had a gap: Nobody was doing molecular biology experiments in orbit. The Boeing colleagues were on the lookout for startups with products that could be brought to market faster through space experiments. In 2014, the miniPCR bio co-founders showed up with their new product at MassChallenge, a Boston startup accelerator program where they met Scott Copeland, Boeing’s director of International Space Station (ISS) research integration, and Kevin Foley, Boeing’s program director of commercial space. “And in the same hour, it can make billions of copies of that DNA sequence.” “In an hour, PCR can scan the entire genome to find that needle in the haystack to learn the state of a single gene,” said Kraves. This smaller machine could be programmed by a phone and easily operated by pilots, astronauts or students in unconventional laboratory settings, such as the depths of the ocean, outer space or classrooms. ![]() Kraves’ and Alvarez Saavedra’s solution was the miniPCR, a soda can-sized device that costs only a few hundred dollars, can run on batteries and delivers robust and reproducible PCR results that help researchers quickly answer their genetics questions. While PCR technology isn’t new, the machines used to analyze DNA are typically large and cumbersome, require a lot of power and cost thousands of dollars each. Several years earlier, Sebastian Kraves and Zeke Alvarez Saavedra, long-time researchers in Cambridge, Massachusetts, were thinking about ways to make polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technology more accessible. Then, in 2015 she came across a contest created and sponsored by Boeing that would change her life. When she was curious about an issue, she explored papers and had the scientific literacy to understand them. At Fox Lane High School in Bedford, New York, Boguraev took advanced science classes and read extensively outside the classroom. Her fifth grade science teacher was unfailingly supportive and helped Boguraev connect her creativity to her love of science. The daughter of two computer science researchers, Boguraev dreamed of becoming an author, an animator, an astronaut-and even the sun, until she was informed that was not an option. She asked a lot of questions, loved looking at the stars and was set on getting a PhD long before most kids knew what that meant. When she was 4, she built a cardboard rocket ship. From the time she was a child, Anna-Sophia Boguraev has had her eye on space.
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