Note: This blog post isn't done yet. It was basically a piece I started to throw all of my creative juices into while I kept my lab report as boring and academic as possible. However, what I'm doing in the lab (a 4000-level microbiology course) is anything BUT boring. 

For the past two years, I’ve been eyeballs deep in Biotechnology studies at university. In those two years, I’ve gotten a summary of basically everything scientists know about biology… which isn’t really a whole lot. 

Physics, mathematics, and even chemistry are pretty well understood these days. After all, scientists began to revolutionize mathematics as early as the 1400s, though algebra has been known about since the Babylonians started solving quadratics in 2000 BCE. Once Calculus was developed in the 1500s and 1600s, the study of Physics took off, culminating in the invention of the nuclear bomb. Alongside Physics, Chemistry was also experiencing a sort of revolution, since understanding atomic bombs and space travel required a solid understanding of Chemistry, too. 

However, Biology- the scientific study of life- was pretty much left on the back burner for that whole time. Until the 1970s and 1980s, most of the technology required to study biology at a molecular level (where all of the fun stuff happens) didn’t exist. But even then, the technology to study biology at the molecular level wasn’t cheap or accessible enough for most scientists and researchers to obtain until the late 1990s and early 2000s. 

Even still, everyone- from the general public, to the government, to the scientists themselves- were terrified of advancing biotechnology, especially after several major, high-profile fuck-ups that resulted in patients dying in horrific ways. 

All that basically explains why the study of Biology and the development of Biotechnology have only started to see some major progress in the past 25 or so years. 

Crazier still, I get to have a part in advancing this knowledge in one way or another, as a lowly undergrad, right now.