On Oct. 7, 1991, the University of Washington (UW) announced a $12 million gift from Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates to recruit Lee Hood, MD, Ph.D. to Seattle from Caltech. Hood, well known for developing the automated DNA Sequencer and four other game changing instruments at Caltech — founded and chaired the UW’s Department of Molecular Biotechnology.

Dr. Hood has also co-founded numerous life science companies, including Amgen (1980), Darwin Molecular (1992), Rosetta Inpharmatics (1996), Institute for Systems Biology (2000), and Arivale (2015) among others.