It is time to shake off the fear of “Frankenfoods” and embrace the genetic editing of farm animals for disease-resistant, fast-growing super-cows and chickens, a science conference has heard.
In the future humans will eat meat and eggs and drink milk from animals for whom the natural selection of desirable traits has been sped up using cutting-edge techniques to make them “more efficient”, said Dr Jon Oatley, of the college of veterinary medicine at Washington State University.
It has, he said, been possible to produce bulls that are sterile and inject them with stem cells from a prize male with edited genes. The sterile bulls act as “surrogate sires”, producing sperm that carries the genetic material of the gene-edited bull.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is consulting on allowing food from gene-edited animals to be sold in Britain, having opened the door for genetically altered plants to be sold in supermarkets as soon as this year.
The techniques available are used to “accelerate” the selection of traits that occur naturally in an animal or plant, creating what are known as precisionbred organisms, or PBOs, Oatley said.
This is different from GMOs, genetically modified organisms, where material from other species is spliced into DNA to create “abnormal” and unnatural alterations, he said.
The GMO process prompted the coining of the word “Frankenfoods” from opponents in the 1990s, but modern techniques “don’t create foreign or abnormal things that could never arise in nature”, he said before a talk entitled “Harnessing tech solutions to nourish the world” at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Arizona.
The Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act 2023 allows the sale of gene-edited plant products in England, but the government is consulting on secondary legislation to allow the same for animals. The act only permits genetic edits that “could have resulted from traditional processes alone”.
Humans have been interfering with the genetics of animals for years by selectively breeding cows, sheep, pigs and chickens that grow more quickly, produce more milk, develop thicker wool or lay more eggs, to produce offspring that share these traits, Oatley said.
Carrots, for example, are not naturally orange. Orange ones were created in the Netherlands in the 17th century by mixing yellow and purple varieties.
Modern gene-editing techniques allow scientists to perform the same process, but greatly sped up. It allows them to identify naturally occurring genes in an animal linked with faster growth or greater resistance to infections to ensure that the next generation is born with those traits and will pass them on.
The gene-editing process would not lead to the creation of anything outlandish, such as six-legged chickens or gigantic cows, Oatley said.
He said instead it would mean the breeding of pigs that are resistant to porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome and chickens that are resistant to avian influenza, minimising waste from animals that die. Cattle would reach adult size more quickly.
Oatley said: “If an animal takes two years to reach market weight, that’s two years of [consumption] and methane emission. What if we shorten that by a year? Now it has a 50 per cent reduction in its impact on the environment.
“We are also trying to overcome some of the things where traditional, conventional husbandry practices have reduced the welfare of animals.”
Farmers often cut the tails of sheep, known as “docking”, to prevent maggot infestations, while the beaks of chickens are trimmed to prevent them from violent pecking. However, scientists could find the genes that create naturally short tails or beaks.
Oatley added: “I think the fear and concerns in the public … is that GMO strategies were putting foreign DNA into the genome of animals, things that could never arise in nature, using ‘recombinant’ DNA, things you couldn’t bring along by breeding.”
He said those developing new geneediting techniques were trying to teach the public about the “new narrative”.
He said he had obtained authorisation in the US to make pork sausages from a pig whose DNA had been modified using the Crispr technique, which allows precise edits to DNA strands.
“I’ve had very little backlash,” he said.
“Most people are more than interested, more than willing to consume the product.”
Monday, February 16, 2026
ZZ26011 Frankenfoods V01 160226
Sunday, February 8, 2026
ZZ26010 Biotech Futures V01 080226
British firms are brilliant at biotech.
We must not squander our lead
Biotechnology is one of the most revolutionary yet underappreciated technologies of our time. This year alone it promises personalised cancer vaccines, cures for rare childhood diseases and the ability to design and print new DNA to kill bacteria. It is expected to contribute upwards of $2 trillion to the world economy by the end of the decade, transforming everything from medicine to manufacturing.
But Britain, despite our historic strength in this area, risks missing out.
The sector consistently produces pioneering innovation, yet equity financing for British biotech was down 49 per cent in 2025 and venture capital funding fell 13 per cent. Restrictive regulations mean many British biotech products can be sold in other countries but not here, where they were invented.
It would be a tragedy if Britain — the country where the structure of DNA was discovered, where a mammal was first cloned, and which birthed the Nobel Prize-winning AlphaFold — were to miss out on this moment. It holds the promise of not only medical advances but also the ability to biologically grow rocket fuel, magnets, fibre-optic cables and many other industrial inputs. But if we do not act, we will miss out. China is already hustling to take over biotech — as it has so many other industries.
My Stanford colleague Professor Drew Endy warns that biotech is the sector most likely to produce a “Sputnik moment”, a Western realisation of how far ahead China is in a defining tech. Last year, the US National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology warned that Beijing was three years away from achieving biotechnology dominance. Already, many Western pharmaceutical companies are dependent on WuXi AppTec, the socalled Huawei of biotech, and other Chinese firms such as BGI Group.
This matters because China weaponises dependencies. Biotech also has a slew of uses beyond medicines. It can be used to transform, and indeed grow, manufacturing, computing and military materials. If Beijing achieves dominance, it is much more likely the 21st century will be the Chinese century.
Beijing has been investing heavily in biotech for decades. It began with crops, as it strove for food security, but has now extended to other fields. Almost half of all new drugs entering human trials last year were from China, as were well over half of the active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) in antibiotics. But the real chokepoint lies upstream, where Beijing controls the production of key starting materials that go into APIs for drugs like amoxicillin and penicillin.
Beijing is now funding foundational research in a way that we in the West are failing to. As China is radically raising its expenditure, the US is cutting back. I increased UK R&D spending to record levels, and Labour has boosted it again.
But we will never be able to compete in pure funding terms with the US and China. So we have to box clever.
We are getting some things right.
More than half of all European advanced therapy clinical trials take place in the UK. The MHRA, our medicines regulator, is taking a sensible approach to genetic medicines for rare diseases. Rather than requiring each drug to be approved, it instead plans to greenlight techniques: once approved, any drug made using the method will be cleared automatically, saving time and cutting costs.
But on other things we are moving far too slowly. AI-driven drug discovery holds huge promise. At the moment, developing a new drug is a laborious process: 90 per cent of efforts fail at the first hurdle. But AI is changing that, moving it from being a lab-based process to a computer-driven one — from in vitro to in silico, as the industry jargon has it.
This has already accelerated and doubled the success rate of medicine development. Sir Demis Hassabis’s London start-up Isomorphic Labs is one of the leading companies in this field, with almost $3 billion in pharmaceutical partnerships. It promises to be one of the most significant UK start-ups since chip-design company Arm.
But there is an opportunity to create more British winners — and cure more diseases. We have world-leading biobank and genomic sequencing data libraries, and the health data held by the NHS is more comprehensive than any other set in the world. If UK firms were given preferential access to this NHS data, we would provide a compelling reason for companies to be based here.
Our rules and regulations are also holding us back. British scientists have developed a new purple tomato that contains antioxidants helping reduce the risk of cancer. You can buy it in America, Australia and Canada, but not here; it hasn’t yet been approved. Companies won’t stay long in a country where their reward for innovation is to be told their new products cannot be sold.
If growth is truly our national priority, we must resolve this problem. If the Genetic Technology Act we passed in 2023 does not go far enough, then update it. We must also avoid aligning with EU biotech regulations — a precautionary approach fundamentally ill-suited to an era of rapid innovation. If we sign up to these rules to try and facilitate agricultural trade, we will make ourselves internationally uncompetitive.
Biotechnology draws on two of our great national strengths: life sciences and artificial intelligence. If we were to miss out on this multi-trillion-pound revolution because of our failure to use our national data, reform restrictive regulations and fix a flawed financing model, it would show us to be fundamentally unprepared to take advantage of the opportunities of the coming decades.
Biotechnology would be a good place to start demonstrating that Britain really is serious about growth.
Sunday, January 18, 2026
ZZ26009 UK Rockets V01 180126
Skyrora is a leading British aerospace company headquartered in Glasgow, Scotland, that aims to provide sovereign orbital launch capabilities for the United Kingdom. Founded in 2017 by tech entrepreneur Volodymyr Levykin, the company is widely regarded as the UK's answer to the "NewSpace" movement.
As of early 2026, Skyrora has officially transitioned from a research-and-development startup to a licensed launch operator.
1. Key Milestones (2025–2026)
• First UK Launch Licence: In August 2025, Skyrora became the first British company to receive a launch operator licence from the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). This gives them the legal "green light" to launch from UK soil (specifically the SaxaVord Spaceport in Shetland).
• Launch Schedule: While sub-orbital tests were targeted for late 2025, the flagship orbital vehicle, Skyrora XL, is currently slated for its maiden flight no earlier than late 2026.
• Sovereign Capability: Unlike many UK space firms that launch from the US or Kazakhstan, Skyrora designs, manufactures, and tests its rockets entirely within the UK (with a major factory in Cumbernauld).
2. The Rocket Fleet
Skyrora uses a "stepped" approach, building smaller rockets to test technologies before moving to orbital vehicles:
• Skylark Nano & Micro: Small sounding rockets used for initial testing and educational outreach.
• Skylark L: A sub-orbital rocket (11 meters tall) designed to reach altitudes of roughly 120km–130km. It is the "testbed" for the engines used in the larger orbital vehicle.
• Skyrora XL: The company's flagship 3-stage orbital rocket. It is 23 meters tall and designed to carry up to 315 kg into Sun-synchronous or polar orbits—ideal for the growing market of small satellites.
3. Sustainability and "Green" Spaceflight
Skyrora differentiates itself by focusing heavily on environmental impact:
• Ecosene Fuel: The company has developed a proprietary high-grade aerospace fuel made from unrecyclable plastic waste. This fuel produces significantly lower carbon emissions than traditional RP-1 (kerosene).
• 3D Printing: They utilize Skyprint 2, which is the largest hybrid 3D printer of its kind in Europe. In late 2025, they partnered with the European Space Agency (ESA) to 3D print components using a new high-temperature alloy called Tanbium, which reduces material waste by 95%.
• High-Test Peroxide (HTP): Their engines use HTP as an oxidizer, which is much more stable and environmentally friendly than traditional toxic propellants.
4. Leadership and Operations
• CEO & Founder: Volodymyr Levykin.
• COO: Dr. Jack-James Marlow (promoted to Chief Operating Officer in late 2025).
• Workforce: The company now employs over 100 people across its headquarters in Glasgow, its factory in Cumbernauld, and its engine testing facility in Fife.
ZZ26008 Weighing Molecules using Light V01 180126
Refeyn is a life sciences instrumentation company based in Oxford, UK, that has pioneered a revolutionary technology called mass photometry.
Spun out of the University of Oxford in 2018 (from the lab of Professor Philipp Kukura), the company provides instruments that can "weigh" individual molecules using only light. As of 2026, it is recognized as a leader in bioanalytical tools, having placed over 500 instruments in labs worldwide.
1. The Core Technology: Mass Photometry
The fundamental breakthrough of Refeyn is the ability to measure the mass of single biomolecules in their "native state" (in solution) without needing to attach fluorescent labels or tags.
• How it works: When a molecule in a liquid sample lands on a microscope glass slide, it scatters light. This scattered light interferes with the light reflected from the glass surface. Refeyn’s software analyzes this interference pattern (the "contrast") to determine the exact mass of that single molecule.
• Speed and Precision: A typical measurement takes only one minute and requires a very small amount of sample.
• Output: The result is a mass histogram showing the different populations of molecules in a sample (e.g., showing if a protein is existing as a single unit or has clumped into "aggregates").
2. Product Lineup
Refeyn offers a suite of benchtop instruments tailored for different biological targets:
• TwoMP: The flagship model, optimized for proteins, nucleic acids, and small complexes (30 kDa to 5 MDa).
• SamuxMP: Specialized for AAVs (Adeno-Associated Viruses), which are used in gene therapy. It can quickly distinguish between "full" capsids (carrying the gene) and "empty" ones.
• KaritroMP: A "macro" mass photometer designed for much larger particles, such as lentiviruses and large viral vectors.
• TwoMP Auto: An automated version that uses robotics to process up to 14 samples (or more with 96-well plate compatibility) without human intervention.
3. Key Software and Innovations (2025–2026)
• StreamlineMP: A new modular software platform launched in late 2024 to automate data analysis for specific applications, such as Antibody Stability and aggregation analysis.
• MassFluidix® HC: A microfluidic system that allows researchers to measure samples at high concentrations by performing ultra-rapid dilutions (in under 37 milliseconds) right before the measurement.
• MassFerence®: A range of standardized protein calibration kits to ensure results are consistent across different laboratories and instruments.
4. Company Status and Leadership
• Recent Recognition: In January 2026, Refeyn was officially recognized as a Top Employer in the UK for its high-performing workplace and people strategy.
• CEO: Gerry MacKay serves as the Chief Executive Officer.
• New Chairman: In June 2025, Jean-Paul Mangeolle (formerly President of Sciex) was appointed as Chairman of the Board, succeeding Jonathan Flint.
• Board Expansion: In late 2025, the company added Dr. Susan Altschuller as a Non-Executive Director to provide financial and strategic insight for global scaling.
ZZ26007 Metal Alloys and Additive Manf V01 180126
Alloyed is an advanced materials and manufacturing company based in Oxford, UK. It specializes in the digital design and production of high-performance metal alloys and complex metal components, primarily using 3D printing (additive manufacturing).
The company was formed in 2020 through the merger of two University of Oxford spin-outs: OxMet Technologies (experts in alloy design) and Betatype (experts in additive manufacturing software and process control).
1. The Core Philosophy: "Digital Metallurgy"
Traditionally, creating a new metal alloy can take decades of trial and error. Alloyed treats metallurgy like a computational problem.
• Alloys-by-Design (ABD®): This is their proprietary software platform. It allows engineers to simulate millions of different metal combinations to find the perfect recipe for specific needs (e.g., a metal that is incredibly light but can withstand the heat of a jet engine).
• The "Full Stack" Approach: Alloyed doesn't just design the metal; they also design the internal structure of the part and control the 3D printing process itself. This ensures that the final product actually performs as the computer predicted.
2. Key Markets and Applications
Alloyed focuses on industries where performance is critical and "standard" metals aren't good enough:
• Aerospace & Defense: Creating lighter, more heat-resistant parts for turbines and rockets. In 2025, they successfully tested a new 3D-printed microturbine for defense applications.
• Medical Devices: Designing titanium implants with porous "bone-like" structures that help the body heal faster.
• Electronics & E-mobility: Developing alloys with better thermal conductivity to keep high-performance batteries and chips cool.
• Jewelry & Luxury: They have even worked with companies like Anglo American to develop new, high-strength platinum alloys.
3. Recent Milestones (2025–2026)
• Series B Funding: In March 2025, Alloyed raised £37 million ($46M) to expand its manufacturing capacity. Their facility in Abingdon now houses one of the largest fleets of metal 3D printers in Europe.
• Global Expansion: They have established a strong presence in Japan through a capital alliance with NTT DATA and work closely with JX Advanced Metals (now JX Metals). They also have a regional office in Seattle, USA, to support the American aerospace sector.
• Leadership: The company is led by CEO Michael Holmes, with the scientific vision guided by Professor Roger Reed, a world authority on metallurgy.
Thursday, January 15, 2026
ZZ26006 Chip Lithography - ASML V01 150126
The most complex machine ever built by humans costs $400 million, weighs 165 tons, and is made by a company most people have never heard of ASML, based in the Netherlands, controls 90% of the global lithography market. Lithography is the process that prints the microscopic patterns on every chip. Nvidia, Apple, AMD — none of their designs can be manufactured without ASML's equipment. Their newest system, called High NA EUV, requires 250 crates and three Boeing 747s just to ship. Installation takes 250 engineers working for six months. Only five have ever been delivered. Light is used to create the patterns on the chips. Modern chips need patterns smaller than visible light can print. The wavelength of the light is too large…
So ASML's solution was to use a type of light that doesn't naturally exist on Earth. A high powered laser fires at tiny droplets of molten tin 50,000 times per second. Each droplet travels at 150 mph and gets hit three times. The first pulse flattens it into a pancake, the second rarifies it into a low density gas, and the third ionizes everything at 220,000 degrees. This creates a plasma that emits extreme ultraviolet light at a wavelength of 13.5 nanometers. That light then bounces off mirrors made by German company Zeiss - the smoothest objects ever manufactured by humans. Each mirror costs $70 million and is coated with 100 alternating layers of silicon and molybdenum, each only a few atoms thick.The whole thing operates in a complete vacuum because the light gets absorbed by everything, including air. 100,000 components sourced from 5,150 suppliers globally. ASML only makes about 15% of the parts themselves. This took 30 years to develop. Their first prototype in 2006 produced one wafer in 23 hours. Current machines produce 200/hr. These machines are required for every flagship smartphone chip, every AI processor, every cutting edge GPU made in the last five years. But ASML's dominance extends far beyond that. They control 90% of the market that makes the prior generations of chips also. Nikon and Canon split the remaining scraps. China has spent tens of billions trying to replicate these machines. Reuters reported in late 2025 that a prototype exists in Shenzhen, but working chips aren't expected until 2028 at the earliest. The problem isn't money or talent — you cannot compress three decades of iterative failures, supplier relationships, and manufacturing refinement.ASML isn’t resting. Their next generation machines are rumored at $700 million each. Jensen Huang dominates AI hardware headlines. Sam Altman owns the AI software conversation. Meanwhile the Dutch company that makes nearly all chip manufacturing possible operates mostly outside public attention attention.
ASML (Advanced Semiconductor Materials Lithography) is arguably the most critical company in the global technology supply chain. Headquartered in Veldhoven, Netherlands, it is the world's sole provider of the machines required to manufacture the most advanced microchips.
As of early 2026, ASML has cemented its position as a "bottleneck" company; without their technology, the production of high-end processors for AI, smartphones, and supercomputers would effectively grind to a halt.
1. What They Actually Do
ASML does not make chips. Instead, they build photolithography machines (often called "scanners").
• The Process: Think of these machines like high-tech slide projectors. They use light to print microscopic circuit patterns onto silicon wafers.
• The Precision: Their latest machines can print features as small as 8 nanometers—roughly 1/10,000th the width of a human hair.
2. The Monopoly: EUV Technology
The reason ASML is so famous (and valuable) is their Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) lithography.
• Exclusive Provider: ASML is the only company in the world that can make EUV machines.
• The Physics: EUV light has a wavelength of just 13.5 nm. Because this light is absorbed by almost everything (including air), the entire process must happen in a vacuum using the world's flattest mirrors.
• The Cost: A single EUV machine is roughly the size of a double-decker bus, costs upwards of $200–$350 million, and requires several Boeing 747s to transport.
3. Market Position and Financials (2025–2026)
As of January 2026, ASML is one of Europe’s most valuable companies, recently crossing the $500 billion market cap milestone.
• Market Share: They hold approximately 83% of the global lithography market and 100% of the EUV market.
• Top Customers: Their "Big Three" customers are TSMC (Taiwan), Intel (USA), and Samsung (South Korea).
• Recent Performance: In late 2025, the company reported annual revenues exceeding €28 billion, driven by the massive demand for AI chips (like those from NVIDIA, which are printed using ASML machines).
4. Why They Are Geopolitically Vital
Because ASML’s machines are the "printing presses" of the modern world, they are at the center of the "Chip Wars" between the U.S. and China.
• Export Restrictions: The Dutch government, under pressure from the U.S., has restricted ASML from shipping its most advanced EUV and high-end DUV (Deep Ultraviolet) machines to China to prevent them from catching up in advanced chip manufacturing.
5. The Future: High-NA EUV
ASML is currently rolling out High-NA (Numerical Aperture) EUV machines. These "Next-Gen" systems allow for even higher resolution, enabling the industry to move toward 2nm and 1.4nm chip nodes over the next few years. Intel was the first to receive a prototype of this system in late 2024.
Monday, January 12, 2026
ZZ26005 Quantum Computing - UK V01 120126
UK must act now or lose the quantum race
Talk of the government investing significant funds into the UK’s quantum computing sector this year arrives at a decisive moment, but that talk must translate into action. Quantum computing is a rapidly accelerating frontier technology crucial to national security and sovereignty, and the stakes for getting this investment right could not be higher if the UK is to maintain its historical lead.
Britain has been a first mover in quantum since its inception. Many foundations of quantum computing, from the first quantum algorithms to the principles of error correction that make large-scale systems possible, were developed by scientists working in the UK, and early government backing ensured that talent stayed here. Yet what happens next will define whether we build a national industry and ecosystem with deep, resilient roots or become a follower.
Every major advance in computing has driven productivity, prosperity and new industries.
Quantum computing is the next such leap. By operating under a different set of physical rules, it enables calculations beyond the reach of today’s most powerful computers.
From drug and materials discovery to aerospace design, battery chemistry and complex optimisation, the world already uses highperformance computing to solve its hardest problems. However, as we have seen with AI, the power consumption of classical compute, and the data centres that support it, is rising unsustainably, bringing rocketing energy demands.
Quantum computing will solve problems that classical machines cannot solve, while dramatically reducing energy needs.
Recent breakthroughs have delivered the innovations needed to build large-scale quantum computers now, using standard semiconductor manufacturing, as well the ability to run more complex algorithms and operate at lower energy usage.
This marks a turning point.
Progress in quantum computing is no longer about discovering new core scientific principles. Instead, it is about engineering reliable systems that can be manufactured with the infrastructure we have today and deployed broadly by corporations and governments. Our roadmap will also allow full quantum data centres, which will be exponentially more efficient. We have reached the end of the beginning.
As quantum computing moves from research and development (R&D) into engineering and commercial delivery, clarity about what matters is critical. Leadership in quantum will not come from excelling in a single lab metric, but from building an ecosystem. Hardware, software, skilled engineers, manufacturing capability and anchor customers will bring quantum to land, sea and space — reinforcing itself over time. That requires a different approach to investment. R&D procurement is different from procuring the strategic, commercial technology that matters next. R&D can hit every technical milestone on paper but fail to deliver anything usable at scale.
“Relatively small sums spent wisely now will create the ecosystems that we need
Government support helped drive the UK’s early quantum leadership. The UK’s national quantum programme, set up in 2014, directed strategy and more than £1 billion in investment. It successfully encouraged people — including myself — to stay here and help build companies and the technology.
That early lead has since been contested. Other nations have adopted similar strategies while momentum in the UK has slowed.
The window to act remains open, but it is narrowing.
Silicon Valley offers an example of how well-timed, strategic procurement and investment that bridges R&D labs to engineering capacity helped build out what became the world’s hub for classical compute.
That helped to make California the world’s fourth-largest economy.
Relatively small sums spent wisely now will create the highly skilled jobs, communities and hardware and software ecosystems the UK needs.
It will anchor our nascent quantum sector with deep roots, and build sovereign capabilities not easily replicated elsewhere. The government can also act as — and enable — flagship anchor customers, helping new companies accelerate their product roadmaps. Building sovereign capability is not about protectionism, but about ensuring the UK has the ability to build, deploy and benefit from strategically important technologies as they mature.
My startup, Oxford Ionics, was acquired by the US group IonQ, and I now lead the company’s global quantum computing programme from the UK. That decision reflects a deliberate commitment to build and scale quantum computing capability here, bringing significant inward investment and driving rapid growth in engineering and high-tech manufacturing jobs at our Oxford site. In nascent industries like quantum, these early decisions matter. Once highly skilled teams and capabilities are embedded, they become exceptionally difficult, and costly, to move. The time is now, or the UK’s quantum leadership opportunity may be gone forever.
• Chris Ballance is the co-founder of Oxford Ionics and president of quantum computing at IonQ