Science, Curiosity, Community, and a Life Well Lived: A Conversation with Professor Dick Burgess

At FAR Biotech, we’re fortunate to be guided by hands-on advisors who have not only shaped the scientific landscape but also bring a spirit of curiosity that extends far beyond the lab.

Prof. Richard (Dick) Burgess, Senior Oncology Advisor to FAR, is the James D. Watson Professor Emeritus of Oncology at UW–Madison’s McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research. He is credited with discovering the first positive transcription factor (sigma) and the sub-unit structure of E. coli RNA polymerase—breakthroughs that helped to launch the modern field of gene regulation. He also founded the UW Biotechnology Center, which catalyzed Wisconsin’s biotech ecosystem that is flourishing today.

Outside of science, Dick was a Varsity basketball player at CalTech and is a winemaker, amateur geologist, fisherman, and lifelong learner. In this conversation, he reflects on what makes research transformative, how new tools like QuantumAI fit into the journey of drug discovery, and why curiosity and balance have guided his life inside and outside the lab.

You’re credited with discovering the first positive transcription factor, sigma, and the sub-unit structure of E. coli RNA polymerase. Looking back, what made those discoveries possible, and what do you see as their lasting impact?

DB: Part of making a major discovery is simply being in the right place at the right time. I’d been a graduate student for three or four years at that point, working with Jim Watson at Harvard. I worked hard, made plenty of mistakes, and learned from them. Eventually, through a mix of persistence and serendipity, I was able to purify the enzyme in a new way and realize that RNA polymerase could be divided into two parts.

One part could make RNA but didn’t know where to start. The other part couldn’t make RNA, but it could direct the enzyme to start at the right place—at the beginning of genes. That was a new way of thinking about gene regulation, and it opened up an entirely new field: transcription factors.

In E. coli, for example, there are seven different sigma factors, each directing the polymerase to read different classes of genes. It was the beginning of understanding the proteins that regulate which genes are turned on and off.

You founded the UW Biotechnology Center back in 1984, well before biotech was the force it is today. What do you remember about that time in Madison, and how do you see the City’s role in biotech now?

DB: In 1983–84, I took a sabbatical at a biotech company in Seattle called Genetic Systems, one of the earliest publicly-traded biotech companies after Genentech and Cetus. That experience impressed me. Unlike academia, which often stopped at “that’s interesting” after a discovery, the company was laser-focused on applying science to real-world problems—in this case, diagnostics for sexually transmitted diseases.

When I returned to Madison, I realized we had an incredible concentration of biological scientists—about one-third of the faculty—but little visibility and few mechanisms to turn discoveries into applications. So I founded the Biotechnology Center.

We set up shared resource facilities for DNA sequencing, monoclonal antibodies, protein synthesis, transgenic animals, and more. We were able to bring in $10 million worth of state-of-the-art equipment—a lot back then—giving researchers, both at the UW and in the start-up biotech companies in the area, access to essential tools they wouldn’t otherwise have

The impact was huge. The number of Wisconsin biotech companies grew from three to 150 during the 12 years I was director. I’ve been a booster for start-ups ever since, which is how I got involved with FAR Biotech—I thought the company had real potential and, over time, I saw ways I could be helpful.

You’ve spent decades at the frontier of gene regulation and protein purification. How do you view the rise of computational approaches like FAR Biotech’s QuantumAI in the larger arc of drug discovery innovation?

DB: In the beginning, there were drugs that worked. People knew, for example, that the bark of a certain tree contained aspirin. Traditional medicines from India and China often had a biochemical basis. 

Slowly over time, we learned more and more about how things worked, and the process flipped. Instead of starting with a drug that seemed effective and figuring out why, we began by saying, “In a cancer cell or in a disease, this particular enzyme is important. If we can knock out that enzyme, we might cure the disease. So let’s go look for a drug that does exactly that.”

So instead of taking a drug that showed some usefulness and figuring out how it worked, we started to go the other way and said, “Here is a target, let's find something that activates or inhibits it.”

In my own lab, we did some of this work. Students from pharmacology came through, and although we didn’t discover new drugs, we learned a lot about the process. Back then, the main tool was high-throughput screening. Instead of testing one compound at a time, you could test thousands—even tens of thousands. The problem was, to really have a chance at success, you’d need to screen hundreds of thousands or millions, even billions. That was expensive, and my lab could only afford a library of about 5,000 compounds.

Then came in silico screening—trying to match the shape and chemistry of a compound with the chemistry of a target site on the protein. That was helpful, but limited. What excites me about FAR’s QuantumAI technology is that it takes this a step further. It allows you to search billions or more novel compounds in a more fundamental way. From there, you can narrow down to a few hundred that look promising, and then test them with more conventional enzymatic or cell-based assays. That way, you validate not just which ones look like they fit in a model, but which ones actually work. When I first heard about it, I thought that this approach could be transformative.

What excites you most about FAR Biotech’s focus on “hard-to-drug” targets and applying quantum mechanics to identify novel molecules?

DB: Traditional chemistry looks at functional groups—amino groups, carboxyl groups, charges. But quantum mechanics gives you a more fundamental view. It captures outer electron interactions that a chemist might never have considered.

In other words, you can discover molecules that a “normal” chemist wouldn’t think to try. It’s a more sophisticated way of seeing how molecules interact and, as far as I know, nobody else is approaching drug discovery quite like this.

From your vantage point, what qualities distinguish research that changes the field from research that makes a smaller ripple?

DB: Science advances through a back-and-forth between theory and tools. Sometimes people have a theory but lack the tools to test it. Then a new tool comes along, and suddenly new experiments—and new discoveries—are possible.

Some tools are incremental, making things faster, cheaper, or more accurate. Those are valuable. But sometimes you get a fundamentally new way of looking at a problem. That’s what I see in FAR Biotech’s QuantumAI—not just an incremental improvement, but a shift in perspective.

You’ve advised companies, edited journals, taught at Cold Spring Harbor, and mentored generations of scientists. What lessons do you try to pass on to young researchers?

‍DB: First, don’t be afraid to make mistakes. You often learn more from a failure that you figure out than from an experiment that works exactly as expected.

Second, know your field deeply. That way, when you see a surprising result, you’ll recognize it as important rather than dismissing it as an error. You learn to see and consider the “outlier” result.

And third, surround yourself with people who bring different perspectives. Brainstorming with people from different backgrounds often yields more progress than working with a group that all thinks the same way. That’s something I enjoy about FAR’s advisory group—everyone brings different expertise, and together we see things we wouldn’t on our own.

You’re also a winemaker, amateur geologist, fisherman, and family man. How do those pursuits feed back into your scientific life?

DB: I took courses in winemaking and cheesemaking and quickly realized how relevant my training in biochemistry and microbiology was. After all, fermentation and microbial processes are some of the oldest biotechnologies. Besides, I’m rather fond of the end results.

I’ve always loved rocks. I could have been a geologist. I’m fascinated by why minerals have the colors and properties they do—turquoise being blue, jade often being green. It’s curiosity about how the world works.

Fishing, gardening, even basketball and playing with my grandchildren—these are ways to step back, relax, clear your head, and make space for new ideas. Often your best thoughts come when you’re out in nature or doing something physical. Life balance is important.

If you had to draw a parallel between winemaking and science, what would it be?

DB: They’re very similar to cooking and science. You usually start with a recipe, but as you gain experience, you learn what’s essential and what you can improvise.

In winemaking, for example, you decide how long to ferment, whether to push down the skins, whether to extract more color. After 30 years, my colleagues and I knew which variables mattered and which we could play with.

Science is the same. You start with protocols, but you learn when to bend them. Many published methods aren’t optimized. By adjusting things—incubation times, purification steps—I was often able to get much better yields than others. That willingness to test the boundaries is how progress happens.

What’s one piece of advice you’d give to scientists who are trying to do something ambitious, difficult, and new?

DB: Ask the hardest important question you can realistically answer. Easy projects rarely lead to breakthroughs. But if you pick a big, meaningful question, and you have a shot at answering it, the payoff can be tremendous.

And don’t underestimate the value of new tools. Many of my successes came from adopting new technologies early—like gel electrophoresis in the 1960s. Technical advances often make the impossible possible. That’s why I see QuantumAI as one of those important new tools.

If you were embarking on your research career today, what specific areas would you focus on?

DB: It’s hard to say. My career began in an era when purification and characterization of proteins were central, before we had tools like crystal structures, cryo-EM, or AlphaFold.

If I were starting today, I’d want to learn how to mine the enormous datasets now being generated. The key is knowing the right questions to ask, because there are millions you could ask of the same data.

But I also still love protein biochemistry—the craft of separating, purifying, and using proteins. That curiosity about how things work hasn’t left me.

Prof. Burgess’ perspective reminds us that progress in science often comes from two things: asking bold questions and developing better tools to answer them. His career—from foundational discoveries in transcription to helping build Wisconsin’s biotech community—is proof of how those principles can transform entire fields.

At FAR Biotech, we carry that same mindset forward. QuantumAI represents a new approach to drug discovery, one that allows us to see interactions that traditional approaches miss. With advisors like Dick, we’re building on decades of scientific insight while charting new paths toward therapies for some of the hardest-to-drug diseases.

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Note: This interview was lightly edited for readability.

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