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What happens when biology becomes something we can design, build, and test like never before?
Join us at Queensberry Hotel to explore how scientists are engineering living systems for medicine, technology, and life beyond Earth. From using artificial intelligence to design entirely new proteins from scratch, to merging living cells with microchips to create biohybrid machines, to engineering strawberries that could feed astronauts on long‑haul space missions, this night showcases biology at its most inventive. Expect bold ideas and a glimpse of the future of life sciences.
Join us at Queensberry Hotel to explore how scientists are engineering living systems for medicine, technology, and life beyond Earth. From using artificial intelligence to design entirely new proteins from scratch, to merging living cells with microchips to create biohybrid machines, to engineering strawberries that could feed astronauts on long‑haul space missions, this night showcases biology at its most inventive. Expect bold ideas and a glimpse of the future of life sciences.
From Living Cells to Biohybrid Machines: These Are the Models We’re Looking For
Bram Servais
(Bram Servais is a biosystems engineer specialising in microfluidics, microfabrication and biointerfaces, developing advanced platforms for brain research and next-generation biohybrid technologies.)
What happens when living cells meet microchips? A journey from brain-on-a-chip and animal alternatives to the rise of biohybrid machines.
Engineering a complete use strawberry for Space and Earth
Declan Lafferty
(I am a Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne and the ARC Centre of Excellence in Plants for Space. Using synthetic biology and plant transformation, I work to improve strawberry traits, helping these plants produce more food with less waste. I’m passionate about developing new crop varieties that tackle modern challenges, from sustainable farming on Earth to feeding astronauts on future space missions.)
Space travel is tough, but it’s better with strawberries! My research is part of the ARC Centre of Excellence in Plants for Space, where our group is engineering alpine strawberries to be the ultimate complete use, zero waste crop with the aim of providing fresh, sustainable nutrition for long-haul missions to Mars and beyond. Utilising plant transformation and synthetic biology techniques, we aim to produce more fruit with less waste, improve leaf palatability (to make them edible) and introduce inducible gene switches, allowing astronauts to toggle between growing new plants and producing fresh fruit on demand.
When Proteins Go Off‑Script: How AI Changes What Biology Can Do
Cyntia Taveneau
(Cyntia studies proteins, the molecules behind many of life’s essential functions, and how AI can help design new ones. Her work brings biochemistry and computing together to explore new possibilities in protein design.)
What if we could go beyond the proteins nature has already made? Evolution has shaped proteins for billions of years, and they carry out many of the functions that keep cells alive. For a long time, scientists could only study nature’s designs. Now AI is helping us go further: not just finding proteins, but beginning to design them, opening new possibilities for biology and biotechnology.
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Queensberry Hotel
593 Swanston St, Carlton, Melbourne, Vic 3053, Australia