A Life Decoded: My Genome: My Life

In my view this is a great book, a good read. It reminds me of Chuck Yeager's autobiography Yeager: An Autobiography. The same in-your-face self-confidence and drive. Craig Venter is a genuine pioneer of modern science. If he comes across as a bit cocky, that's because he is, and deservedly so. I don't expect my heroes to be even-handed or self-effacing. The real message of this book is the appalling way that in-house government science uses public funds to suppress competition. This happens too often. The reason the U.S. does not have heavy-duty rocket power is that NASA suppressed work on the "big dumb boosters" in the 1960s because they saw such work as competition to their cherished high-tech (also obscenely expensive and fault-prone) space shuttle dreams. Consequently we depend on Russia to do the heavy duty space launches. We almost lost the Pacific War in World War II because of the incompetence of the Newport Navy Laboratory -- see Anthony Newpower's true story of this sad tale in Iron Men and Tin Fish: The Race to Build a Better Torpedo during World War II (War, Technology, and History). There is no reason why the NIH should have done the human DNA job. I say this with full respect for and without minimizing the personal leadership and achievements of Drs. Watson and Collins -- see in particular the excellent books by Francis S. Collings The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief and Coming to Peace With Science: Bridging the Worlds Between Faith and Biology. But their work would have been better spent helping along the general scientific community rather than playing politics and suppressing the competition. There is a role for Government "Institutes" but that role is not to take sides. I fondly recall the research sponsoring work of the Office of Naval Research (Bob Miller and Randy Simpson) back in the days when I started out as a young Ph.D. That was the right way to sponsor science. Clearly DNA sequencing of living species would have been done anyway without the massive government funding of NIH, because of the vast potential for commercial use. The record of his achievement proves that Venter's private venture did the job much faster, vastly cheaper and more accurately. I applaud him for his fight to make the code available to the scientific community -- even at considerable personal cost and over the objections of his less idealistic commercial partners. HMSchallenger

Someone suggested skipping the early chapters in which Venter describes his childhood. That would be a mistake. In contrast to the current day in which parents rigidly structure the free time and play activites of their children, Venter was told in his 1950s childhood to "Go play!". That, plus his high IQ, were a formula for either failure or success on a large scale. Venter succeeded in a grand way that has transformed biology. And he did it in spite of obstacles placed in his way from unexpected, and disappointing, quarters. What, for example, should one make of James Watson and Francis Collins, who could have improved their own images immeasurable by acting for the best of the science, rather than for what was best for themselves? "What's in it for me?" seems to be a common whine heard from many of those working for Venter as well as against him. What he accomplished was a marvelous achievement, made even larger by the fact that he had so much opposition, personal, political, scientific. While this may not be high literature, it is a scientific adventure story of a high order. Read it, and be sure that your children have freedom to play and be creative.

January 25, 2008, Page B3, The Wall Street Journal "Scientists Advance In Effort to Create Synthetic Organism" "Biologist Craig Venter and his team replicated a bacterium's genetic structure entirely from laboratory chemicals, moving one step closer to creating the world's first living artificial organism." Craig Venter strikes again. As reported in the story in The Wall Street Journal and other international news, the baddest boy in biology since James Watson and his team made a tremendous, Galileo-like or Einstein-like advance. Venter's story is remarkable. A California surfer dude, he's drafted during the Vietnam War and winds up working in a DaNang hospital treating thousands of mangled and maimed young soldiers. Transformed by trauma, he embarks on a life in medical science, famousy cracking the human genome in 2000 and now seeking to create life itself. The story was told in 2005 by James Shreeve in "The Genome War." It's a fine book. But now we have a first-person account, a tell-all account in which Venter pulls no punches. It may be the finest book about biological science since James Watson's "The Double Helix".

Venter is known as a controversial figure in UK where I live. He became known for trying to make a fortune out of patenting genes. So I wanted to read this book to see just what Venter had to say. It was truly a revelation. The first fifty pages had enough excitement curiosity and adventure for a complete life story. But this is the story of a high school dropout and surfer traumatised by Vietnam war experience becoming a world leading scientist. In fact all his post-war effort has been put into furthering science and medicine to try to understand and enhance life in all forms. The entrepreneurial effort was purely to further scientific discovery rather than a money grubbing exercise widely portrayed. The vindictiveness and double dealing of business and scientific colleagues were but obstacles to overcome in reaching successive goals. After reading the book and seeing his continuing program one is inspired. Controversial is a total misnomer. The UK scientific community and the even BBC do not come out well. It should be read by all aspiring scientists to prepare them for the pitfalls of being a pioneer thinking outside the box. It is not an exaggeration to compare him to Einstein. Apart from that it is a ripping good story with many fascinating scientific facts relating Venter's genome to his life story.

Having read The Genome War, I had preordered Venter's own story. I was not disappointed. The Publisher's Weekly review sniffs that it is "clumsily written." I would attribute that opinion to one of two possibilities. Either the reviewer never got beyond the early chapters about his childhood, which are marred by cliche and some amateurish prose, or the reviewer does not know enough biology to understand the rest. Once past the early biography, the rest of the book is riveting. I would warn those considering it that a reasonable knowledge of biology and genetics is almost a requirement to enjoy the story. I teach medical students and have studied molecular biology (unknown when I was a medical student) and it taxed my knowledge to the limit to understand his accomplishments. Still, the book reminds me a bit of "Science Fictions," the account of the discovery of the AIDS virus, which pulled no punches in naming villains and fakers. Venter is settling a few scores but, having read the other book, I am inclined to accept his version of the story. Biology research is not beanbag, to paraphase an old aphorism, especially when the stakes are high. There are titanic egos in this story, not just that of the author. If you like biology and genetics and want to read about the biggest big game hunt in biological science history, this is a good place to start. The best part of the story begins as he returns from Vietnam, a near failure in high school, now stimulated by his experiences as a corpsman to study and go to medical school. He has married a New Zealand girl he met on R & R in Australia. They both go to UCSD once they have mastered junior college. Here he becomes interested in biochemistry, then cell biology. He is the beneficiary of the interest of a noted cell biologist who likes his story and encourages him to do research. Eventually, this leads to a PhD only seven years after his return from the war. He goes on to a medical school faculty position, gradually building his research credentials until he is invited to join the NIH. He tells the story of his research into the nature of the adrenaline receptor, the link that allows the hormone to stimulate the heart to beat faster and more powerfully. From there, he begins to study the genetics of the receptor. From there, he climbs the path to world fame and meets some nasty surprises in fellow scientists whose personal ambition cancels their devotion to science. I highly recommend this book to those with some background in biology and genetics. He tries to simplify for a broader audience but the subject is still complex. I read the book in two days, actually taking longer than I might with another non-fiction book because it requires concentration and some rereading to understand the details. The science, not the author, is the hero here and it takes some time to understand it all.