I realize it may have been an offhand answer, but what do you have in mind? Go get a graduate level understanding of biochemistry? Start working with genomic data? Etc.

(Assuming a CS background) To do anything useful/fun/interesting in bio you should have a strong understanding of the Central Dogma, once you understand that you can move on to the rest. Many here recommend building gene analytics and other similar software/SaaS. I don't recommend it because you learn absolutely nothing from those low hanging fruits. Genetics and its relation to CS, at a sufficiently low level, is mostly string manipulation and search. There is a market if you are willing to build and do sales but it's hardly exciting. Better to get some actual wet lab experience and understanding, than become yet another "data science" biotech startup. We have had enough of those in healthcare already, tons of so-called "health tech" companies that were merely performing analytics on wearables. Profitable? Maybe. Exciting and innovative? No.

Some reading material:

Synthetic biology: A Primer

An introduction to systems biology (get the 2020 edition)

O'Reilly: Biobuilder

Molecular biology of the Gene

Campbell's Biology

YouTube Channels:

The Thought Emporium

Josiah Zayner

Khan Academy Biology

Biology Professor

Shomus Biology

(The first two deal exclusively with bioengineering)

> Molecular biology of the Gene

I really, really wish this book would stop being recommended. It doesn't teach any biology, just a lot of random facts disconnected from reality about a fictional average eukaryotic cell. Nowhere in it do you build an intuition about working with biological systems.

Sorry I meant Molecular Biology of the Cell. I think it's meant as a reference more than anything else. Bio is like ML in that it moves very quickly, so there is the need for constantly updated evergreen texts.

Whoops, I thought you meant MBoC as well. I also wish everyone would stop recommending that one, too. I don't think it's even a good reference. I can safely say that I never got any useful information out if it during the course of my graduate work in biology.

What Bodies Think About: Bioelectric Computation Outside the Nervous System (youtube.com) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18736698

The Information Revolution has only just begun. ;-D

Here's one of my favorite intros to cell biology: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~wcohen/GuideToBiology-sampleChapter-r...

There's also an older HN discussion about it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10961440

> In a word: biotech.

Can you explain way? People keep saying this, and I really don't see it, despite having done my graduate work in biology.

I'm a weirdo, and my particular answer may seem waaaaaaaay out there, but you asked, so let 'er rip:

Did you watch the "What Bodies Think About" lecture I linked in a sib comment?

I suspect that we are on the cusp of a bio-information revolution.

Study of evolving systems indicates that intelligence is ambient in the biosphere.

Now some people have been "talking" to life since the dawn of time, and now Levin's work (it's his talk) is filling in the scientific basis for what Robert Anton Wilson and others call the "Neurosomatic" circuit of awareness.

We should be able to e.g. learn to "talk" to our own tissues and regenerate organs and limbs. (We might not need any technology to do it.) Also, see Findhorn (the gardens and spiritual community in Scotland) where they communicate with Nature spirits. We are just at the point where science can begin to validate this sort of thing, which will obviously lead to a major shift in global society/civilization.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Findhorn_Foundation

Will compilation to categories have an impact on biotech, more specifically on synthetic biology?

I think so (but I'm not a domain expert.)

Start with these folks: http://www.appliedcategorytheory.org/

Any good resources you have for beginners in biotech?

The Machinery of Life

good answer