Decoding Life Through Quantum Science with the Quantum Biology Institute

GM GM! Welcome to another fantastic episode of DevNTell. For those who don't know, DevNTell is a 30-minute podcast held every Friday, giving founders, hackers, and builders a platform to showcase their work. Today, I'm ecstatic to welcome Dr. Clarice D. Aiello from the Quantum Biology Institute. This institute is engineering the future of biology using quantum degrees of freedom in living beings. Stick around to meet Dr. Aiello and learn about quantum biology and how the institute was co-founded. Let's get into it!

GM Clarice, I'm thrilled to have you here today. Stanley Bishop, a friend of the show, highly recommended you. Quantum biology sounds like a complex and fascinating topic, and I'm eager to learn more. Before we dive into the details, could you introduce yourself to our audience?

I'm happy to be here, Narb! I was born and raised in Brazil and trained as an experimental quantum physicist. I've been in the US since 2007, starting in academia before leaving to found the Quantum Biology Institute. This institute is part of a larger ecosystem that includes a research arm, a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) for the community, and soon, an incubator for quantum biology technologies.

That's an impressive background! What specifically motivated you to enter this field?

Quantum biology explores the extent to which biology might run on quantum principles. It suggests that events at extremely small and fast scales can have macroscopic influences on biology over longer periods. While not a new field, it hasn't quite reached the mainstream. Our goal at the institute is to provide enough data to definitively prove or refute this, potentially transforming technology and the future of biology.

It's not just you behind the institute, right? Would you like to give a shout-out to your team?

Absolutely! We have a fantastic team at the DAO building our community and a group of dedicated scientists and support staff at the institute. What makes us special is that we are a group of scientists comfortable with being uncomfortable. Quantum biology is inherently interdisciplinary, where physicists and biologists learn from each other every day in the lab. This strong collaboration is rare and essential for exploring this scientific frontier.

I love that mindset of being 'comfortable with being uncomfortable.' It's a great mantra for meaningful work. Could you share the origin story of how you all found each other?

My journey into quantum biology started from my background in building instruments to control quantum objects like electrons, a field called quantum sensing. My PhD focused on technological quantum sensors using electrons trapped in diamonds, often used to measure magnetic fields. After a challenging PhD, I spent time teaching and then became a postdoc in a chemistry lab.

In that chemistry department, I discovered that chemists had known for decades that certain electrons within proteins exhibit quantum sensing of magnetic fields. While they didn't call it quantum sensing, the connection between their observations in test tubes and my work with inorganic materials became clear. This led me to the broader implications across biology.

A key example is bird migration. Birds use the Earth's very weak magnetic field for navigation, and the leading theory is that this is mediated by quantum phenomena within their proteins. This hypothesis has been around since 1978 and matches observations in test tubes at room temperature.

The challenge is that proving quantum activity within a single living cell is difficult because quantum states are fleeting and easily disturbed, eventually becoming 'classical.' We need to measure if quantum effects can last long enough to be biologically relevant, which requires entirely new instruments.

So the institute is not only doing research but also developing the very apparatus needed for that research?

Exactly. We need to go beyond the data that has existed for decades. We are building what I call 'glorified microscopes' with quantum capabilities. These instruments will allow us to study and control electrons inside proteins in the same way physicists do with inorganic materials, all while keeping the cells alive and functional.

Why hasn't there been a larger effort in this field before your institute? Is it just the technical difficulty?

It requires a unique blend of quantum physics, chemistry, and biology. Traditionally, the field has been underfunded because the existing evidence was mostly correlative, which made it harder to attract talent and investment. Our funding came from a successful crypto-raise by our DAO, which gives us the freedom to invest time and money into building these multi-million dollar machines.

We also prioritize open science. We plan to put our entire scientific process, including lab notebooks and raw data, online in real-time. This open-source approach aims to accelerate progress and invite more participation in the field. It's an experiment in how science itself can be done differently.

That's incredible. I'm excited to see the impact of that approach. Let's talk more about the specific research at the institute and its significance.

While birds are the historical starting point, we're looking at much broader effects. Decades of evidence show that weak magnetic fields—similar in strength to those from a cell phone—can affect many biological processes: cell growth, metabolism, DNA repair, and more. Our goal is to move from these disconnected observations to a deterministic 'codebook' or 'cookbook' for controlling biology using quantum knobs.

Our instruments use light emitted by proteins, which carries quantum signatures, to infer the state of internal electrons. This isn't just basic science curiosity; it has massive implications. Imagine non-invasive treatments using magnetic fields delivered via a phone app, like helping with wound healing or even treating cancer.

We've conducted extensive studies on tadpoles, showing that Earth's tiny magnetic field significantly impacts their growth speed. If we ever want to colonize Mars or produce food in space, we must understand how different magnetic environments affect biology. Nature is the ultimate quantum engineer, and we have much to learn from how it manages quantum effects at room temperature.

This is truly mind-blowing. If anyone wants to dive deeper into this field, what resources would you recommend?

I highly recommend the book 'Life on the Edge' by Jim Al-Khalili and Johnjoe McFadden; it's a great introduction for non-experts. You can also visit our ecosystem website at quantumbiology.eco for one-page briefs on topics like quantum biology and AI, health, or space. We also post our data and manuscripts, including a massive 250-page study on tadpoles, on our GitHub.

We'll have all those links in the show description. We have a question from the audience: Is there a token people can use to support the research?

Yes! Our token is called QBIO. We were incubated by BioProtocol, and we're very active in our Discord at quantumbiology.community. We'd love for people to join us there, learn more, and support our mission.

Clarice, thank you so much for your time. This has been a fascinating conversation, and I'm sure our audience has learned a lot. Wishing you and the institute all the best in your research!

Thank you, Narb! I'm always happy to talk about this field. If you're ever in LA, come visit our headquarters. We'd love to continue this conversation anytime!

It's on my list! Thanks again, Clarice. Happy Friday everyone, have a great weekend, and we'll see you next week for another episode of DevNTell. Cheers!