Life Sciences Industry

Life Sciences Industry

The life sciences industry comprises businesses and institutions that research, develop and commercialise products related to biology, medicine, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals and healthcare. Institutions and firms engaged with life sciences play a significant role in advancing scientific knowledge, developing new technologies and treatments, improving global health and driving economic growth and innovation. Solutions for enhancing quality of life—medical treatments, pharmaceutical discoveries, invention and design of devices or improved yields in agriculture—are intrinsically linked with the pace of development in science and technology. From the ancient days of using primitive tools and localised knowledge, civilisations have progressed over centuries on the strength of new breakthroughs supported by advancements in computing, communication and cross-pollination of ideas.

Evolution of the Life Sciences Industry

The beginnings of the need for therapeutic and medical solutions have been driven by the need to survive and combat the adversities in the environment, whether it was to protect against the vagaries of the weather or animals or other warring humans. Solutions aimed at human preservation or therapeutic treatment were essentially localised and developed through trial-and-error methods—tested primarily on an opportunistic basis. Some of these principles and methods have been codified by the masters of these practices or their followers in due course of time.

History and mythology are replete with examples of the interventions of masters or gods whose efforts were idolised and celebrated. In Greek mythology, Apollo and his son Asclepius are considered the gods of healing. The symbol of Asclepius, the rod of Asclepius, is a staff with a single serpent coiled around it and remains the universal symbol of medicine today. In Hindu mythology, Dhanvantari is considered the god of Ayurveda and physician of the gods. His birthday and the divine origins of healing and health are celebrated two days before Diwali as Dhanteras. As per Chinese mythology, Shennong, the divine farmer, is considered the god of agriculture and herbal medicine and is credited with writing the Shennong Bencao Jing (Divine farmer’s classic of Materia Medica), the oldest text on Chinese herbal medicine. Egyptian mythology considered Imhotep and Sekhmet the gods of medicine and healing. Brigid and Eir were considered goddesses of healing in the Celtic and Norse mythologies respectively. Sukunahikona-no-Mikoto in the Japanese Shinto tradition, Patecatl in the Aztec tradition and Osain in the African-Yoruba tradition were considered the gods of healing. The common theme found across cultures is the use of natural elements such as water, sun and herbs as the divine tools to cure medical problems, and priests and healers served as channels between divine medicine and human suffering.

Emergence of Modern-Day Scientific Medicine

The formal scientific approach to medicine, agriculture and related fields commenced in Europe during the 16th to 19th centuries, coinciding with the Industrial Revolution. The modern-day empirical scientific medicine could be attributed to Andreas Vesalius, whose book De Humani Corporis Fabrica was published in 1543 and challenged older anatomical traditions. After the French Revolution, hospitals and medical treatments were reorganised in France. The Rothamsted Experimental Station in England (United Kingdom) was founded in 1843 and is often cited as one of the first continuous scientific agricultural research stations. In Germany and France around the mid-19th century, the application of chemistry to agriculture became systematic (for example, the work of Justus von Liebig in Germany). The early foundations of the life sciences domain were centred on advancements in biology, medicine and chemistry through the key discoveries of cell theory in 1838, Louis Pasteur’s germ theory of disease and Mendelian genetics in the 1860s, leading to primitive drug development in the late 1890s. The formalisation of the pharmaceutical industry commenced in the 1900s. The discovery of penicillin and the introduction of insulin for diabetes in the 1920s gave an impetus for mass production in the 1950s. Simultaneously, medical devices for X-ray and electrocardiography also started to become key aids for medical treatments. Many drug merchants across the United States such as Squibb, Merck, Parke Davis, Smith Kline and others, who were originally engaged in wholesale procurement and sale of malarial drugs, started expanding their product portfolio and their presence in the markets. The field of molecular biology became prominent with Watson and Crick’s discovery of the DNA double helix in the 1950s. The study of biochemistry and genetics as scientific disciplines led to numerous drug discoveries, supported actively by the investment in academic and industrial research by the United States of America through the National Institute of Health. In parallel, the Food and Drug Administration’s power increased with important legislative and organisational changes. The late 1970s witnessed a surge in the founding of biotech companies and the emergence of genetically engineered drugs. The ambitious Human Genome Project was launched in 1990, and contract research and outsourcing models started gaining momentum in the 1980–1990 period. The first ten years following the year 2000 have experienced advances in bioinformatics, systems biology and personalised medication with the completion of the Human Genome Project.