The Billion Dollar Molecule
One Company's Quest for the Perfect Drug
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The Billion Dollar Molecule
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Narrated by:
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Stephen Bowlby
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By:
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Barry Werth
About this listen
Join journalist Barry Werth as he pulls back the curtain on Vertex, a start-up pharmaceutical company, and witness firsthand the intense drama being played out in the pioneering and hugely profitable field of drug research.
Founded by Joshua Boger, a dynamic Harvard- and Merck-trained scientific whiz kid, Vertex is dedicated to designing - atom by atom - both a new life-saving immunosuppressant drug and a drug to combat the virus that causes AIDS.
You will be hooked from start to finish, as you go from the labs, where obsessive, fiercely competitive scientists struggle for a breakthrough, to Wall Street, where the wheeling and dealing takes on a life of its own, as Boger courts investors and finally decides to take Vertex public. Here is a fascinating, no-holds-barred account of the business of science that includes an updated epilogue about the most recent developments in the quest for a drug to cure AIDS.
©1994 Barry Werth; Introduction copyright 2014 by Barry Werth (P)2021 TantorListeners also enjoyed...
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-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 7
Beginning in the 1970s, several scientific breakthroughs promised to transform the creation of new medicines. As investors sought to capitalize on these Nobel Prize-winning discoveries, the biotech industry grew to thousands of small companies around the world. Each sought to emulate what the major pharmaceutical companies had been doing for a century or more, but without the advantages of scale, scope, experience, and massive resources. From Breakthrough to Blockbuster focuses on both the companies themselves and the broader biotech ecosystem that supports them.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Wonderful book!
- By Momo Abbasi on 04-28-24
By: Donald L. Drakeman, and others
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The Drug Hunters
- The Improbable Quest to Discover New Medicines
- By: Donald R. Kirsch PhD, Ogi Ogas PhD
- Narrated by: James Foster
- Length: 7 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,176
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,066
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,065
The search to find medicines is as old as disease, which is to say as old as the human race. Through serendipity - by chewing, brewing, and snorting - some Neolithic souls discovered opium, alcohol, snakeroot, juniper, frankincense, and other helpful substances. Ötzi the Iceman, the 5,000-year-old hunter frozen in the Italian Alps, was found to have whipworms in his intestines and Bronze Age medicine, a worm-killing birch fungus, knotted to his leggings.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Aargh!
- By Curmud the prof on 05-20-17
By: Donald R. Kirsch PhD, and others
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Ten Drugs
- How Plants, Powders, and Pills Have Shaped the History of Medicine
- By: Thomas Hager
- Narrated by: Angelo Di Loreto
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 4,908
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 4,245
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 4,227
Beginning with opium, the “joy plant,” which has been used for 10,000 years, Thomas Hager tells a captivating story of medicine. His subjects include the largely forgotten female pioneer who introduced smallpox inoculation to Britain, the infamous knockout drops, the first antibiotic, which saved countless lives, the first antipsychotic, which helped empty public mental hospitals, Viagra, statins, and the new frontier of monoclonal antibodies. This is a deep, wide-ranging, and wildly entertaining book.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Engrossing to physicians & lay persons alike
- By C. White on 03-08-19
By: Thomas Hager
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For Blood and Money
- Billionaires, Biotech, and the Quest for a Blockbuster Drug
- By: Nathan Vardi
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 8 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 227
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 189
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 188
For Blood and Money tells the little-known story of how an upstart biotechnology company created a one-in-a-million cancer drug and how the core team—denied their share of the profits—went and did it again. In this epic saga of money and science, veteran financial journalist Nathan Vardi explains how the invention of two of the biggest cancer drugs in history became (for their backers) two of the greatest Wall Street bets of all time.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Must-read for biotech enthusiasts and scientists
- By Anonymous User on 03-16-23
By: Nathan Vardi
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Stealth
- The Secret Contest to Invent Invisible Aircraft
- By: Peter Westwick
- Narrated by: David de Vries
- Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 119
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 105
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 105
On a moonless night in January 1991, a dozen US aircraft appeared in the skies over Baghdad. To the Iraqi air defenses, the planes seemed to come from nowhere. Each aircraft was more than 60 feet in length and with a wingspan of 40 feet, yet its radar footprint was the size of a ball bearing. Here was the first extensive combat application of Stealth technology. And it was devastating.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Good Overview of the original development
- By Amazon Customer on 08-01-22
By: Peter Westwick
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Breakthrough
- Elizabeth Hughes, the Discovery of Insulin, and the Making of a Medical Miracle
- By: Thea Cooper, Arthur Ainsberg
- Narrated by: Teri Schnaubelt
- Length: 9 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 31
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 28
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 27
It is 1919 and Elizabeth Hughes, the 11-year-old daughter of America's most-distinguished jurist and politician, Charles Evans Hughes, has been diagnosed with juvenile diabetes. It is essentially a death sentence. The only accepted form of treatment - starvation - whittles her down to 45 pounds, skin and bones. Miles away, Canadian researchers Frederick Banting and Charles Best manage to identify and purify insulin from animal pancreases - a miracle soon marred by scientific jealousy, intense business competition, and fistfights.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The story
- By suz on 01-26-25
By: Thea Cooper, and others
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Symphony in C
- Carbon and the Evolution of (Almost) Everything
- By: Robert M. Hazen
- Narrated by: Paul Brion
- Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 212
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 177
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 177
An enchanting biography of the most resonant - and most necessary - chemical element on Earth. Carbon. It's in the fibers in your hair, the timbers in your walls, the food that you eat, and the air that you breathe. It's worth billions as a luxury and half a trillion as a necessity, but there are still mysteries yet to be solved about the element that can be both diamond and coal. Where does it come from, what does it do, and why, above all, does life need it?
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5 out of 5 stars
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There is a Caveat
- By Joseph L Contreras on 06-26-19
By: Robert M. Hazen
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Regenesis
- How Synthetic Biology Will Reinvent Nature and Ourselves
- By: George M. Church, Ed Regis
- Narrated by: Peter Lerman
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 74
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 61
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 61
In Regenesis, George Church and science writer Ed Regis explore the possibilities of the emerging field of synthetic biology. Synthetic biology, in which living organisms are selectively altered by modifying substantial portions of their genomes, allows for the creation of entirely new species of organisms. These technologies - far from the out-of-control nightmare depicted in science fiction - have the power to improve human and animal health, increase our intelligence, enhance our memory, and even extend our life span.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Brilliant! But please update!
- By Nick on 01-28-21
By: George M. Church, and others
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Information Architecture
- For the Web and Beyond
- By: Louis Rosenfeld, Peter Morville, Jorge Arango
- Narrated by: Theodore O'Brien
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 29
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 24
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Story4 out of 5 stars 24
Information architecture (IA) is far more challenging - and necessary - than ever. To guide you through this broad ecosystem, this popular guide - now in its fourth edition - provides essential concepts, methods, and techniques for digital design that have withstood the test of time. UX designers, product managers, developers, and anyone involved in digital design will learn how to create semantic structures that will help people engage with your message.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Well organized and right to the points
- By Coco on 06-08-23
By: Louis Rosenfeld, and others
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Tesla
- Wizard at War: The Genius, the Particle Beam Weapon, and the Pursuit of Power
- By: Marc J. Seifer
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 13 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 60
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 50
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 50
Drawing on 40 years of research and a treasure trove of new information, Tesla: Wizard at War provides a comprehensive view of Tesla's discoveries, which continue to influence today's military technology and diplomatic strategies. One of the world's leading Tesla experts, Marc J. Seifer, offers new insight into the brilliant scientist's particle beam weapon (aka the "Death Ray") and explores his military negotiations with pivotal historical figures - including his links to Joseph Stalin, Vannevar Bush, General Andrew McNaughton, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
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5 out of 5 stars
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review from an electrician
- By Ashton Zee on 12-13-21
By: Marc J. Seifer
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Drugs and the FDA
- Safety, Efficacy, and the Public's Trust
- By: Mikkael A. Sekeres
- Narrated by: Mike Lenz
- Length: 8 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 6
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Performance3.5 out of 5 stars 6
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6
Food and Drug Administration approval for COVID-19 vaccines and the controversial Alzheimer's drug Aduhelm made headlines, but few of us know much about how the agency does its work. Why is the FDA the ultimate United States authority on a drug's safety and efficacy? In Drugs and the FDA, Mikkael Sekeres—a leading oncologist and former chair of the FDA's cancer drug advisory committee—tells the story of how the FDA became the most trusted regulatory agency in the world.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Metastic
- By Anne E. Sharman on 05-07-23
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The Myth of Artificial Intelligence
- Why Computers Can’t Think the Way We Do
- By: Erik J. Larson
- Narrated by: Perry Daniels
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 118
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 103
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 101
Futurists insist that AI will soon eclipse the capacities of the most gifted human mind. What hope do we have against superintelligent machines? But we aren't really on the path to developing intelligent machines. In fact, we don't even know where that path might be. Erik Larson takes us on a tour of the landscape of AI to show how far we are from superintelligence and what it would take to get there.
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1 out of 5 stars
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dead wrong after 2 years
- By K. Lyon on 07-11-23
By: Erik J. Larson
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The Frackers
- The Outrageous Inside Story of the New Billionaire Wildcatters
- By: Gregory Zuckerman
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 15 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 859
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 738
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 744
Everyone knew it was crazy to try to extract oil and natural gas buried in shale rock deep below the ground. Everyone, that is, except a few reckless wildcatters - who risked their careers to prove the world wrong. Things looked grim for American energy in 2006. Oil production was in steep decline and natural gas was hard to find. The Iraq War threatened the nation’s already tenuous relations with the Middle East. China was rapidly industrializing and competing for resources.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Balanced approach on controversial topic
- By Chris on 01-02-14
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Computing: A Concise History
- The MIT Press Essential Knowledge Series
- By: Paul E. Ceruzzi
- Narrated by: Tim Andres Pabon
- Length: 3 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 62
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 52
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Story4 out of 5 stars 51
The history of computing could be told as the story of hardware and software or the story of the Internet or the story of "smart" handheld devices, with subplots involving IBM, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, and Twitter. In this concise and accessible account of the invention and development of digital technology, computer historian Paul Ceruzzi offers a broader and more useful perspective. He identifies four major threads that run throughout all of computing's technological development.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Hard to Believe it an "MIT Press" Thing
- By Sam on 05-15-22
By: Paul E. Ceruzzi
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The Demon Under The Microscope
- By: Thomas Hager
- Narrated by: Stephen Hoye
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,493
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,547
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,545
The Nazis discovered it. The Allies won the war with it. It conquered diseases, changed laws, and single-handedly launched the era of antibiotics. This incredible discovery was sulfa, the first antibiotic medication. In The Demon Under the Microscope, Thomas Hager chronicles the dramatic history of the drug that shaped modern medicine.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Book!!!!!
- By Amazon Customer on 05-21-08
By: Thomas Hager
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The Song of the Cell
- An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human
- By: Siddhartha Mukherjee
- Narrated by: Dennis Boutsikaris
- Length: 16 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 862
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 731
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 725
From the author of The Emperor of All Maladies, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, and The Gene, a #1 New York Times bestseller, comes his most spectacular book yet, an exploration of medicine and our radical new ability to manipulate cells. Rich with Mukherjee’s revelatory and exhilarating stories of scientists, doctors, and the patients whose lives may be saved by their work, The Song of the Cell is the third book in this extraordinary writer’s exploration of what it means to be human.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Beyond Words Wonderful
- By Lynn on 11-27-22
What listeners say about The Billion Dollar Molecule
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Alexa
- 05-05-23
Book is interesting but narrator is not
Nothing against the author but it was really hard for me to stay engaged with the narrator. I would find myself spacing out consistently which would detract from the story because of the performance. Because of this I returned the book
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