Ginkgo Bioworks Getting 3.2kB Genes from Twist Bioscience

In California, Twist Bioscience is sending some serious genes to Ginkgo Bioworks. Twist’s genes have up to 3,200 base pairs (or 3.2 kB) in length which is huge in the gene world. Ginkgo commended Twist’s record volumes of high quality DNA which is used in Ginkgo’s organism engineering projects for cosmetics, nutritionals, flavors, and fragrances. Twist uses silicone based platforms instead of the traditional plastic plates which allows them to synthesize the DNA much more quickly and thus being able to achieve the high volumes of DNA that companies like Ginkgo are looking for. Ginkgo and Twist have had a supply agreement since 2015 and recently expanded it to include an additional 300 million base pairs of DNA in 2017.