Episode
Erik Aznauryan: Writing Genes at Scale
- Podcast
- Galaxy Balance
- Published
- Jun 29, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 3646
- Processing state
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Summary
Erik Aznauryan, CEO and co-founder of HarborSite, joins Galaxy Balance to explore the next frontier of genome engineering: moving beyond small edits and toward precise, large-scale DNA insertion. Erik traces his path from Armenia and medical school to Europe, the Church Lab, and eventually founding HarborSite with a mission to make gene insertion safer, more durable, and more programmable. The conversation dives into recombinases, safe harbor sites, payload size limits, delivery vehicles, in vivo validation, AI-driven protein engineering, and the therapeutic promise of inserting full genes or even entire genetic programs into the genome. Cory and Erik also discuss rare disease, cell therapy, skin and liver targeting, regulatory bottlenecks, animal models, funding shifts in biotech, and the long-term possibility of human enhancement in an age of AI. At the edge of science fiction and translational medicine, this episode asks what becomes possible when genome engineering evolves from editing biology to writing biology at scale 00:00 — The North Star for genome engineering 00:36 — Introduction to Erik and HarborSite 01:39 — Erik’s path into science 02:36 — Early fascination with cloning and genome engineering 03:21 — Cory’s own early inspiration 04:03 — Why genome engineering matters 05:24 — Ethical questions around germline engineering 06:37 — Why early-stage intervention matters 07:51 — Technical progress and disease-specific editing 09:25 — Why HarborSite was founded 10:50 — Recombinases as the core technology 12:15 — Engineering recombinases for new DNA targets 13:12 — Novel genomic safe harbors 14:18 — How safe harbors are selected and validated 15:36 — How much target specificity can be changed? 16:36 — Why lifelong expression matters 17:29 — Testing durability in c…