Hood
Lee Hood did that rarest of things. He enabled scientists to see things they couldn’t see before and do things they hadn’t dreamed of doing. In the 1980s, Hood led the team at Caltech that developed the first automated DNA sequencer, a project conceived and led by Lloyd M Smith. That invention set the stage for the Human Genome Project, gave rise to the field of genomics, and enabled scientists to envision a future of personalized medicine. In this engrossing biography, Luke Timmerman tells the life story of an exceptionally driven man. Drawing on never-before-reported details from the scientist’s files, public records, and more than 150 interviews with friends and detractors, Hood is a revealing portrait of one of the most influential biologists of our time and a deeply human look at science itself.
Dr. Lloyd M. Smith, former Hood lab member, will join Luke in a discussion of his time in the Hood lab and the impact of automated DNA Sequencing. Dr. Smith is the W. L. Hubbell and Hall-Fischer Professor of Chemistry and Director of the Genome Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he has been since 1988. Named one of Science Digest's Top 100 Innovators, he has received numerous honors and awards for his research. Dr. Smith’s current research is primarily in the development of new technologies for the analysis and manipulation of biomolecules.
Presented in partnership with the Wisconsin Science Festival.
Luke Timmerman
Luke Timmerman is a biotech journalist, author, and entrepreneur. He is the founder of Timmerman Report, a leading biotech newsletter, and the author of "Hood: Trailblazer of the Genomics Age," a biography of automated DNA sequencing pioneer Leroy Hood. Forbes called the book a “must-read.” Timmerman has a bachelor’s in journalism from the University of Wisconsin, and in the 2005-2006 academic year, he was awarded a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship at MIT. In 2015, Scientific American named him one of the 100 most influential people in biotech.