FOUNDER
Zachary Lafer
A builder exploring AI products, XR and research prototyping. Zach’s ethical-tech focus centers on care, honesty, dignity and human agency: tools that help people understand, connect and create.
Explore Zach’s creative lab ↗EARLY-STAGE RESEARCH · HUMAN-GUIDED AI
Small structures.
Extraordinary
possibilities.
Building toward an autonomous, end-to-end protein research lab: connecting computational design, experimental testing and evidence-driven iteration.
A local prototype today. An end-to-end research lab to work toward.
RP / MOLECULAR EXPLORERILLUSTRATION · NOT A MOLECULAR SIMULATION
A chain becomes a shape. Shape helps make function possible.
COMPUTATION → EXPERIMENT → UNDERSTANDINGSCROLL TO EXPLORE ↓
01 / THE POSSIBILITY
What if discovery
had a better co-pilot?
Biology is wonderfully complex. Our ambition is to connect the steps of protein research, so a good question can travel further.
From proposing designs to evaluating structures, planning experiments and learning from results: a connected research loop, with people setting the purpose and making consequential decisions.
Meet the principles behind it ↗02 / INSIDE THE IDEA
Five little agents.
One big question.
A visual story about the lab we want to build.
Scrub the journey. Meet the crew. Keep a human in the loop.
01 / INSIDE THE GPUCONCEPT FILM · ILLUSTRATIVE
A small team inside a big idea.
Five conceptual collaborators explore designs inside the compute layer. Their work stays bounded, inspectable and supervised.
A HYPOTHESIS YOU CAN INSPECT
Look closer.
Ask better questions.
Explore a visual design sketch. Highlight a segment, compare the views, or move in toward a conceptual contact region.
Drag the divider to reveal a highlighted segment. This is a visual comparison, not a predicted effect of a mutation.
ORIGINAL BLENDER DESIGN STUDY
VISUAL SKETCHES · NO COMPUTATIONAL OR EXPERIMENTAL RESULT
MEET THE CONCEPTUAL CREW
Different roles.
Shared responsibility.
Select an agent to look inside its role. These characters describe a proposed workflow, not five validated autonomous systems.
01 / QUESTION
Scout asks the right questions.
HUMAN CHECKPOINT
03 / AMBITION, WITH THE LABELS ON
Keep possibility
separate from proof.
Progress deserves clarity. Here is the line between the prototype we are exploring and the research system we hope to build.
No wet-lab or therapeutic validation. No clinical efficacy or safety claims. All molecular and laboratory visuals on this page are conceptual illustrations.
04 / WHY THIS MATTERS
It starts
with people.
A frightening family experience with pulmonary blood clots made the question personal.
Could future protein research help clear dangerous clots while reducing bleeding risk? That is a research motivation, not a treatment claim. Understanding the tradeoffs would require rigorous laboratory and clinical evaluation.
Our broader ambition is to help people live healthier lives and contribute responsibly to preparedness against disease and biological threats.
CURIOSITY, IN SERVICE OF CARE.THE NON-NEGOTIABLES
01
People keep the controls.
Humans define goals, review evidence and decide whether consequential work moves forward.
02
Make uncertainty visible.
Predictions are hypotheses. A compelling visualization is never a substitute for experimental evidence.
03
Build care into the loop.
Safety review, privacy and responsible boundaries belong in the research process from the beginning.
AN UNEXPECTED BEGINNING
Two ideas.
The same direction.
They arrived with the same question:
what if we could see proteins in VR?
As Zach and Byron tell it, they met at a Qualcomm, HackerSquad and Meta hackathon. Independently, both had come wanting to visualize proteins in virtual reality.
Then they compared notes. Two separate ideas became a combined team — and the beginning of a shared research ambition.
THE FOUNDERS’ STORY · A CHANCE MEETING, A SHARED CURIOSITYZLZACH’S IDEA
BLBYRON’S IDEA
A SHARED VIEW OF POSSIBILITY
Two teams. One conversation.
A new beginning.
A new beginning.
FROM THE ROOM
A conversation can change the direction.
Zach at the hackathon. The founders recall arriving independently with the same idea: visualizing proteins in VR. Comparing notes brought their teams together.
Event photograph supplied by the founders.05 / THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE QUESTION
Two perspectives.
A shared horizon.
COFOUNDER
Byron Lee
Byron’s background spans bioinformatics, scientific AI and research operations. His mission is to extend healthspan, lifespan and peakspan: more time living well and at one’s best. Indefinite life extension is a personal aspiration, not an achieved scientific outcome.
Explore Byron’s experience +
Cellico.Bio
Founder · Scientific AI & Computational Biology
January 2026–present
Edison Scientific
AI Evals Contractor
September 2025–present
Biopunk Community Lab
Project Management Intern
February 2026–present
Yunes Foundation for Research on Aging
Vice President, Board of Directors
September 2024–present
Previously Secretary, Board of Directors
February 2021–September 2024
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Research Technician, Assistant Lab Manager, IT Manager
October 2013–May 2015 · Walter Lab, UCSF
Selected professional experience. Education and career details supplied by the founders.
MS, Biology — Bioinformatics · Georgia State University, 2017–2021. BS, Biology · Georgia Institute of Technology, 2004–2012.
THE NEXT CHAPTER IS RESEARCH
Think small.
Care enormously.
A future lab starts with an honest prototype.
Explore what we’re building, and the boundaries that guide it.