BEAM

Beam Therapeutics Inc.

A biotechnology company using a gene-editing technique called base editing, which rewrites single letters of the DNA code without cutting the strands the way traditional CRISPR does — swapping one base for another, like an A for a G, to fix disease-causing mutations. Its early work targets conditions such as sickle cell disease. Founded in 2017 by gene-editing scientists including David Liu, the company's name plays on "base" editing and the pinpoint focus of a beam.