News
Harvard Medical School Cancels Student Groups’ Pro-Palestine Vigil
News
Former FTC Chair Lina Khan Urges Democrats to Rethink Federal Agency Function at IOP Forum
News
Cyanobacteria Advisory Expected To Lift Before Head of the Charles Regatta
News
After QuOffice’s Closure, Its Staff Are No Longer Confidential Resources for Students Reporting Sexual Misconduct
News
Harvard Still On Track To Reach Fossil Fuel-Neutral Status by 2026, Sustainability Report Finds
The Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT announced a partnership last week with Calico, a life sciences company backed by Google, to advance research on age-related diseases and therapeutics.
Eric Lander, president and director of the Broad Institute, said in the press release announcing the partnership that the collaboration will foster progress on the understanding and treatment of age-related disease by combining the Institute’s scientific knowledge with Calico’s expertise in therapeutics.
Much of the Institute’s work focuses on uncovering the genetic basis of major diseases and brings together researchers from Harvard, MIT, Harvard-affiliated hospitals, and other partner institutions.
Calico Life Sciences LLC, short for California Life Company, is a biotech research and development company with the aim of building understanding of aging and its associated diseases. The company is currently led by CEO Arthur D. Levinson, the former CEO of Genentech and a former director at Google. Calico was founded by Levinson and Google.
"This alliance is a key part of Calico's strategy to bring the best cutting-edge science to bear on problems of aging,” Levinson said in the press release.
The Broad Institute has a wide range of collaborations, including more than 100 projects across more than 40 countries, according to its website. Last year, researchers at the Institute discovered several gene mutations that potentially protect against type 2 diabetes.
Paul Goldsmith, a spokesperson for the Broad Institute, declined to release more details regarding the collaboration because it is still in a developmental stage.
—Staff Writer Zara Zhang can be reached at zara.zhang@thecrimson.com. Follow her on Twitter at @zarazhangrui.
Want to keep up with breaking news? Subscribe to our email newsletter.