In this episode, I talk to Fernando Portela,

a software engineer andamateur scientistwho works on RNA design — the problem of composing an RNA sequencethat has a specific secondary structure.

We talk about how Fernando and others compete and collaborate in designing RNA

molecules in the online game EteRNA and about Fernando’s newRNA design algorithm, NEMO, which outperforms all prior published methods by a wide margin.

Links:

• The EteRNA game
• The preprint about NEMO
• NEMO project page
• Single-cell RNABIO & organoids meeting in Kiev