The "Ilulissat Manifesto" -The Merging of Bio and Nano
With research backgrounds ranging from materials engineering to
molecular biophysics, the seventeen scientists issued the "Ilulissat
Statement -The Merging of Bio and Nano: Towards Cyborg Cells" last summer at a conference in Greenland, announcing their view that the early twenty-first century is a time of
tremendous promise and tremendous peril. We face daunting problems of
climate change, energy, health, and water resources. Synthetic biology
offers solutions to these issues: from microorganisms that convert
plant matter to fuels or that synthesize new drugs or target and
destroy rogue cells in the body.
"This is a critical moment for synthetic biology," said Paul McEuen, professor of physics, Cornell University. "The choices facing us now — the scientific investments we make and the rules we set down to govern the field — will impact society for decades to come."
"As with any powerful technology, the promise comes with risk," McEuen stressed. "We need to develop protective measures against accidents and abuses of synthetic biology."
Recently the first procedure to create a synthetic organism was patented admist great controversy and concern. While patenting the creation of particular forms of life seems incongruent with higher ideologies, it may be the best way to advance the science.
Companies looking for big pay-offs may be the vest vehicles for moving the science forward. These business-minded, money driven organizations know that they must provide something that is beneficial and usable in the real world. They aren’t so much looking to unravel great mysterious (though they may in the process). What they want is a practical answer to real problems. They want what will sell.
But in their hurry to produce the next big thing, could disaster strike? What exactly are the risks associated with the technology? Nobel Prize winner David Baltimore explains why building smallpox from scratch is a real concern in synthetic biology.
“I think viruses are the major focus of concern. They are relatively simple to make and control and some are quite lethal. Smallpox, for example, is very potent, and we are not protected against it. The smallpox sequence is published, so you could recover it by synthesis if you had the lab facilities to do that. But getting the pieces of DNA to make smallpox is not a backyard experiment. You need a large lab with significant biosafety precautions. I don't see this as something that would happen clandestinely in the U.S., but a well-funded lab outside of this country could do something quite nefarious,” Baltimore explained in a recent interview.
The statement issued by the seventeen scientists mentioned earlier, reads that “we need to develop protective measures against accidents and abuses”. But who is “we”? The threat isn’t so much a well-regulated commercial or government laboratory (although serious accidents are always a possibility), but something more off the books. The real concern is that this new technology could very likely be developed by the “bad guys” as a frightening new form of .
So is the new technology dangerous? Yes. Could this technology end up saving countless lives and clean up many of the environmental messes we’ve created? Yes. Is it worth the risk? Probably.
Posted by Rebecca Sato with Casey Kazan.
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I've noticed Casey's posts almost ALWAYS have grammatical/spelling errors. Not a huge deal, but definitely distracting and it makes her articles seem somewhat less professional than they otherwise would.
Posted by: Peter | September 05, 2008 at 08:50 AM
Actually I wouldn't have brought it up myself
but I also find the little spelling and typos
distracting.
Posted by: Jerry | September 06, 2008 at 09:43 PM
That should read "spelling errors".
Yep, I'm embarrassed.
Posted by: Jerry | September 06, 2008 at 09:47 PM