Eric Hoffman on a Very Discreet Newcomer: Synthetic Biology
By Eric Hoffman,
A World of Science
| 01. 11. 2013
Synthetic biology was one of the themes discussed at the Assises du vivant, a forum organized jointly by UNESCO and the French NGO Vivagora in Paris on 30 November. Synthetic biology is still in its infancy but it has great ambitions: to create entirely new life forms. Borrowing techniques from engineering, the synthetic biologist assembles different parts (genes) to build an entirely new circuit. At the Assises du vivant, one proponent suggested that synthetic bacteria could be designed to glow whenever they detected explosives in the soil, alerting to buried anti-personnel mines. Others cited the potential for synthetic biofuels, biodegradable plastics and cancer drugs. But some participants were more circumspect. ‘Have the necessary safeguards been put in place? ‘, they asked. ‘Could existing organisms not fulfill the same role? Do we know how existing species will interact with these new life forms of our own creation? And what guarantee is there that they will function in the way we intended? We put these questions to Eric Hoffman, a science and technology policy expert with the US branch of the NGO...
Related Articles
By Roni Caryn Rabin, The New York Times | 04.03.2024
By Rob Stein, NPR | 03.21.2024
For the first time, surgeons have transplanted a kidney from a genetically modified pig into a living person, doctors in Boston said Thursday.
Richard Slayman, 62, of Weymouth, Mass., who is suffering from end-stage kidney disease, received the organ...
Sheep have been domesticated for roughly 12,000 years. Sheep have also been cloned since 1996; Dolly (pictured) was the first mammal to suffer that indignity. But this news was featured in the March 14 issue of Business Insider:
Montana rancher paid $4,200 to clone a dead sheep and launched a farm of super hybrids worth up to $550,000
Some people — not just Montanans but Texans too and probably others — pay to indulge in “captive hunting,” and large...
By Matt Novak, Gizmodo | 03.12.2024
An 80-year-old man in Montana pleaded guilty Tuesday to two felony wildlife crimes involving his plan to let paying customers hunt sheep on private ranches. But these weren’t just any old sheep. They were “massive hybrid sheep” created by illegally...