Smile Train is a non-profit organization that Brian Mullaney and Charles Wang founded in 1999 in New York City, New York, that provides resources and trains medical staff in over ninety countries to give free surgeries to children in need of cleft repair. Clefts are birth defects that affect one in 700 children all over the world. They occur when the roof of the mouth, or palate, the lip, or both have a gap or split, because the tissues and bones did not fuse properly during fetal development. Surgeons typically repair clefts within the first year of life because clefts can often cause problems with eating, speaking, breathing, and hearing. Beyond providing cleft surgeries, Smile Train also supports the needs of children with clefts with services such as speech therapy, dental care, and psychological and nutritional support. Smile Train helps provide better access to cleft surgery and care for thousands of children worldwide, which improves the quality of life for people born with the developmental condition.

In February 1975, leading biology researchers and lawyers participated in what became known as the Asilomar Conference, a meeting to discuss and recommend policy regarding novel recombinant DNA, or rDNA, technology. rDNA is DNA that scientists create in a lab by combining genetic material from two distinct sources. A group of researchers, including Paul Berg, Maxine F. Singer, and David Baltimore, organized the Asilomar Conference, which was held at the Asilomar Conference Grounds in Pacific Grove, California. The purpose was to discuss how to manage the risk of researchers unintentionally creating harmful or deadly pathogens through rDNA research. The conference resulted in the creation of the NIH Guidelines for Research Involving Recombinant DNA Molecules in 1976, which outlines biosafety guidelines for researchers working with rDNA. The Asilomar Conference was one of the first instances when scientists gathered independently to discuss and establish precautionary guidelines for research using rDNA, a technology with the potential for wide-reaching applications for medicine, biology, and reproduction.