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Asimov Press

press.asimov.com

Asimov Press publishes deep writing on big ideas in biotechnology.

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Posts: 165 from 28 Nov 2023 to 18 Oct 2026
Posting: weekly (47 in the last year)
Kind: magazine

2026 37

18 OctLong Reads · January 21, 2024 Deliberate Dysentery Progress and pitfalls in human challenge trials — an interview with Jake Eberts of 1Day Sooner, who volunteered for both Zika and Shigella challenge studies. Words by Asimov Press
14 OctLong Reads · January 24, 2024 What Science Can Learn from Car Mechanics An interrogative technique to identify the root of molecular problems. Words by Trevor Klee
12 OctLong Reads · February 5, 2024 Making the First Transgenic Ants Engineered ants are helping to reveal the neuroscience of pheromone signaling. Words by Taylor Hart
1 OctEssay · February 20, 2024 Fast Biology Living cells are frenzied, crowded places. Numbers help us make sense of it. Words by Niko McCarty
28 SepLong Reads · February 27, 2024 Blocked Transmission Fomites are inanimate objects that can transfer pathogens. New-age materials and sprays inhibit their spread. Words by Tom Ough
23 SepFiction · March 7, 2024 The Vector Zoo A tour through the Vector Zoo, where a future city commemorates its victory over zoonotic disease — and the Great Separation that made it possible. Words by Xander Balwit
8 SepUpdates · March 7, 2024 Making of "The Vector Zoo" The triumphs and travails of the writing process. Words by Xander Balwit
10 AprLong Reads · March 19, 2024 Making Cells Young In the laboratory, cellular reprogramming can reverse epigenetic damage and reset cells to a "young" state. Can we do the same for entire organisms? Words by José Luis Ricón
7 AprLong Reads · April 2, 2024 Synthetic Origins Michael Elowitz on the early years of synthetic biology and the programmability of living cells. Words by Michael Elowitz
7 AprLong Reads · March 24, 2024 Beyond Steel Tanks GLP-1 drugs could one day outsell iPhones, but there is not enough biomanufacturing capacity to make them. For solutions, we should look away from the factory. Words by Elliot Hershberg & Niko McCarty
6 AprUpdates · April 5, 2024 Editor's Note Announcing a special mini-issue devoted to biotechnology's role in pandemic prevention. Words by Asimov Press
1 AprLong Reads · April 9, 2024 Discovering an Antimalarial Drug in Mao’s China Chinese scientists discovered artemisinin in 1971 as part of a secret military project that merged Eastern and Western medicine. Words by Wendi Yan
25 MarFiction · April 16, 2024 Tinker What happens when an AI designs the chips needed to make its successors? Words by Richard Ngo
23 MarLong Reads · April 23, 2024 Why Nothing Can Grow on Mars* Water is the most significant bottleneck in terraforming the Red Planet. Words by Devon Stork
18 MarLong Reads · April 30, 2024 Before They Hatch New technologies, such as in-ovo sexing, on-farm hatching, and in-ovo vaccination can make the poultry supply chain both better for animal welfare and more efficient. Words by Robert Yaman
13 MarUpdates · May 5, 2024 Lessons on Starting a Magazine Announcing the first Asimov Press book — and what we've learned so far about starting a magazine and printing books. Words by Editors
11 MarLong Reads · June 2, 2024 The Mouse as a Microscope How the mouse found its way from Victorian novelty to a biomedical mainstay. Words by Alex Telford
9 MarUpdates · June 2, 2024 Editor's Note Introducing Issue 03 of Asimov Press. Words by Asimov Press
7 MarLong Reads · June 9, 2024 Driving Toward Nanopores A nanopore sequencer is a tiny device that can read DNA with high accuracy. Its invention, made possible by merging hardware with machine learning, holds lessons for other measurement tools. Words by Stephen Malina
4 MarEssay · June 13, 2024 What Limits a Genome's Size? A tiny fern has a genome 50 times larger than a human's. Energy and diffusion—not the nucleus volume—are the key bottlenecks to more expansive growth. Words by Niko McCarty
2 MarLong Reads · June 30, 2024 The First Patented G.M.O. The Supreme Court case that built the biotechnology industry. Words by Rhea Purohit
2 MarLong Reads · June 23, 2024 Breaking the Speed Limit on Cell Division The slow growth of model organisms delays biological research. Engineering cells to divide more quickly could speed it up. Words by Kamal Nahas
2 MarLong Reads · June 16, 2024 The Promise of Gas Vesicles Gas vesicles are protein shells that reflect soundwaves. They were first discovered in lake-dwelling microbes in Germany but now enable scientists to "hear" individual cells within the body. Words by Niko McCarty
22 FebEssay · July 10, 2024 Inside the Laboratory for Extraordinary Microbes Cultivarium, a small nonprofit, is building tools to grow and engineer peculiar organisms—and then giving their discoveries away for free. Words by Niko McCarty
19 FebLong Reads · July 14, 2024 Where's the Synthetic Blood? Synthetic blood cells could solve blood shortages, but only if technical challenges are surmounted and costs are slashed. Words by Keith Neeves
16 FebLong Reads · July 21, 2024 Raising Welfare for Lab Rodents The science of animal welfare is exploding, offering new ways to improve conditions for millions of research animals a year. Words by Xander Balwit
12 FebLong Reads · August 26, 2024 Day Zero Antivirals for Future Pandemics Medicines modeled off the innate immune system have the best chance of protecting us during the next viral outbreak. Words by Brian Wang
12 FebEssay · August 25, 2024 Measuring the Black Death Reports suggest that between 40 and 60 percent of the population died during the bubonic plague that swept through Europe in the mid-1300s. What accounts for this wide range of estimates? Words by Saloni Dattani
1 FebLong Reads · August 27, 2024 Defense-Forward Biosecurity DNA sequencing is becoming better and cheaper. So are AI tools that can decode the results. It's time to build a genomic surveillance network that can detect emerging outbreaks at their source. Words by Allison Berke
29 JanLong Reads · August 28, 2024 Is That DNA Dangerous? Synthetic DNA poses biosecurity risks that curated databases and screening algorithms can minimize. Here's how they work now and how they could improve. Words by Tessa Alexanian & Max Langenkamp
26 JanLong Reads · September 8, 2024 On Fables and Nuanced Charts While data visualizations appear to present information objectively, they are laden with assumptions. Some of those assumptions are held by the chart maker, and others are held by you. Words by Spencer Greenberg & Amber Dawn Ace
19 JanLong Reads · September 22, 2024 Making Eggs Without Ovaries It may soon be possible to make human eggs from stem cells, thanks to advances in a technology called in vitro oogenesis. Words by Metacelsus
15 JanEssay · September 25, 2024 How A Cell Anticipates the Seasons Further evidence of biological intelligence. Cyanobacteria can sense shortening days and rewire their cell membranes to prepare for cold weather — all thanks to a molecular clock made from just three proteins. Words by Niko McCarty
12 JanFiction · September 29, 2024 Models of Life In the 2020s, nobody paid much attention to foundation models. But sixty years later, they were being used to design medicines, gene therapies and, eventually, new forms of life. Words by Abhishaike Mahajan
8 JanLong Reads · October 6, 2024 To Be Born in a Bag Despite recent progress, artificial wombs still face technical challenges. De-extinction efforts, of all things, are driving it forward. Just how much is anyone’s guess. Words by Tom Ireland
5 JanLong Reads · October 27, 2024 The Forgotten Pandemic Humans have suffered from tuberculosis for thousands of years and, even today, the disease kills more than 1 million people each year. Yet diagnosing cases remains a challenge. Why? Words by Kamal Nahas
5 JanLong Reads · October 14, 2024 A Defense of Peer Review Why scientists should strengthen, rather than replace, the peer review system. Words by Dan Elton

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