Science Entrepreneurs: Genentech

Genentech (link) is a large biotech company that was founded in 1976 by Robert A Swanson and Dr. Herbert W. Boyer. Genentech in stands fro Genetic Engineering Technology, Inc. One of the company's founder Dr. Hebrert W. Boyer is considered to be one of the pioneers in the field of Recombinant DNA technology. In 1973 Stanley Normal Cohen along with Boyer invented recombiant genetic engineering, by finding out that restriction enzymes can cut segments of DNA from a DNA stand and put it to another similarly cut part. While Cohen was researching in a laboratory, Robert Swanson convinced Boyer to found Genentech, from that point on Boyer worked with Arthur Riggs and Keiichi Itakura from Beckman Research Institute to become the first group to ever successfully express a human gene in a bacterial cell. With this, they produced the hormone somatostatin in 1977. Then the next year, David Goeddel and Dennis Kleid were added to their group to contribute to its success with insulin. Genentech now has over 10,000 members as of 2006 making it a very large company. Genentech excels in the fields of Oncology, Immunology, and Tissue Growth and Repair. They have created an array of medicines:

• 1982 - Synthetic
• 1985 - Protropin
• 1987 - Activase
• 1990 - Actimmune
• 1993 - Nutropin
• 1994 - Pulmozyme
• 1997 - Rituxan
• 1998 - Herceptin
• 2000 - TNKase
• 2003 - Xolair
• 2003 - Raptiva
• 2004 - Avastin
• 2004 - Tarceva
• 2006 - Lucentis

And Genentech also received several awards for their contributions to science:

• "Genentech was named one of the 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers in 2004, 2006 and 2007 by Working Mothers Magazine.
• It was named as one of the 100 best corporate citizens 2005 by the Business Ethics Magazine.
• Fortune Magazine named Genentech number one on its 2006 list of the "100 Best Companies To Work For." And has been on this list for the nine consecutive times, just not as number one.
  
• Genentech was named Top Employer by Science Magazine on October 15, 2007 issue.
  
• Also in October 2007, Genentech was named Most Admired Biotech Company as well as most admired Pharmaceutical company in Fortune in 2008."

Eye Presentation

Information about the presentation
Today, guest presenter Dr. Pamela Fong came to Mr. Olson's Biology class sixth period to give us a presentation and guide us through a dissection on sheep eyes. The presentation informed us on several areas of the eyes and how it works. The eye receives light and sends impulses to the brain in order to process images. The eye is covered by a very sensitive part called the cornea. The cornea is a dense, but sensitive part of the eye. It helps by reflecting light into the eye to generate vision. If sand gets into the cornea don't expect to have a fun time because it will be extremely painful. After the cornea there is the iris. The iris determines the color of your eye and has several fibers inside. The formation of the fibers is unique to everyone (like fingerprints), even though there maybe some that are very similar, no two are exactly the same. Right in between the cornea and the iris is a thin object called a lens. The lens is a hard object that is focused by using muscles in your eye to generate a more sharp or dull image for your brain. Behind the iris is a thin layer called the retina. The retina plays a key role in sight because without it, there can be no images because it sends the images directly to the optic nerve which sends it directly to the brain.

The dissection
After the presentation on the eyes, we were off to our labs to dissect sheep eyes. When I was dissecting the eye I was a little scared because of the look of the eye. I never actually touched the eye, I instead used tweezers and a scalpel to cut open the eye, but it was better then some of my lab partners. Micheal and Sunny were too scared to even look at the eye for long periods of time or even get near it. But despite the fact that I was slightly fearful of cutting the eye, I was still the only person to cut apart the eye and start taking things out of it. I really enjoyed the dissection because I could take out the lens and look at it closely, observe the liquids inside an eye, and really be up close to an actual eye. But the only thing that disappoints me is the minimal time that we were given to do this lab. Wish we could've had a more time. :(

Reflection
I learned a lot about the eye today and it makes me want to know more such as: What is the difference between our eye and the sheep eye? How come I couldn't find any fibers inside the sheep's iris? The lab was very enjoyable and the presenter caught my interest to eyes really fast.