[stubybubs]

https://news.wisc.edu/decades-on-bacteriums-discovery-feted-...

Taq polymerase is about my favorite thing discovered through basic research. Just some scientists looking at interesting stuff in a Yellowstone geyser, who happened to discover the molecule that enabled DNA replication in a lab and essentially exploded the field.

No corporation these days is going to pay somebody to do that. I think it's worth the risks to get something like that.

[dekhn]

Polymerase was already known (isolated ,purified, and characterized in '56); the interesting part of Taq was its thermostability which permits thermal cycling to implement PCR (and other neat techniques).