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First Reproducing Artificial Virus Created
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"If anything can go wrong, it will." -- Edsel Murphy
"If anything can go wrong, it will." -- Edsel Murphy
Re:eesh (Score:5, Interesting)
"I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image."
-- Stephen Hawking
Re:Scared now (Score:3, Interesting)
All cute kittens have a fair number of virii inside their bodies. I guess they are just starting with those. Then they'll make the bacteria in their guts, the ticks/germs on their fur, and finally the kitten.
Re:duh.. I guess humans will do it themselves (Score:3, Interesting)
Its all part of Nature's master plan.
Morals Schmorals (Score:5, Interesting)
The project was funded in part by the Department of Energy, which hopes to create microbes that would capture carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, produce hydrogen or clean the environment.
Okay, so let's assume we do something like this, with the perfectly innocent intention of cleaning up some level of carbon dioxide. Okay, well you're counting on the virus to reproduce, but what if it gets out of control? It eats up ALL the carbon dioxide. All the trees and plants suffocate and die, but that might not happen before the atmosphere goes up in flames since that carbon dioxide is being turned into hydrogen.
Maybe not a likely event, but my concerns are a bit more on the practical side. Frankly, I'm all for creating new forms of life and bringing back extinct ones, just for the coolness of it. I just hope we don't go doing something foolish, which we always seem to manage to do.
Re:Interesting thoughts... (Score:2, Interesting)
That said:
evolution/natural selection is the natural effect when beings are subjected to adversity: only the strong surviveI
Evolution doesn't say that the "strong" survive. Evolution is the simple observation that in any given environment, the creatures most fit for that environment will thrive the most--and, ergo, creatures that thrive the most will be those most likely to survive.
The odds of a mutation creating all parts simultaneously are astronomical, and consequently, the only accepted theory that can sanely describe such a thing is intelligent design,
We don't know what the odds are of any mutation--though we do know that, just in the last 10,000 years, there have been 3,652,500 days. So if the odds are one in a million that a one-day generational organism will evolve a certain set of traits are one in a million, it will have happened three times just since the Neolithic revolution began. And, of course, science believes that Earth is several orders of magnitude older than 10,000 years.
which has been hinted at in many different real-life examples as well as probabistically explained by Pascal's Wager.
Pascal's Wager has nothing to do with evolution, and as a mathematical statement it is flawed based on its treatment of faith as a binary equation. (What if you worship the wrong diety?) God intended there to be doubt in the world, and He is perfectly capable of remedying said doubt when He sees fit.
So as skeptical as I am of intelligent design, I can't help but notice how much of our biological model it predicts.
Intelligent design, like most theories, is little more than untestable conjecture about the past. The uncertainty that must be applied to theroums about archeological past are so great that competetly opposite theories (ID and Evolution) can exist based on the exact same evidence.
Uh... From scratch? (Score:5, Interesting)
The cell then started reproducing. They didn't create the cell. They probably didn't design the genome as much as patch one together from other genomes (though they may have 'created' it - physically manufactured it)
They say it's safe because it only infects batceria. Unfortunately, humans depend on bacteria to survive, so it's not nearly as innocuous as one might like to think.
However, these are nano-machines that might do real work safely (cleaning up chemical toxins, etc) - I'm just worried about mutations and how they will develop. You can't create life and expect it to reproduce itself without change over time. Pretty soon it'll discover that human skin is much more plentiful than the chemical toxins it was eating, and it'll change its diet.
-Adam
Open Source... (Score:2, Interesting)
Ok, this is the Craig Venter of Celera fame. Remember the great Human Genome race? Celera wanted "to patent those parts of the genome it thinks are important and useful, charging researchers who want access to the sequences. Celera has already filed preliminary patents for 6,500 genes."
But the knowledge to produce viruses for whatever purpose goes open source. Bizarre - this guy wants to patent the air we breath and then make fusion weapons technology open to everyone, on the theory that white hats will always prevail.
Problem is, some things are not readily defended against, and viruses have to be one of the things we are least effective in blocking. Sorry Craig, I'm not sure we need to turn a thousand tigers loose before we've REALLY learned to tame the ones that are out there already.
"The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals. We cause accidents."
Re:eesh (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Resident Evil anyone? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Morals Schmorals (Score:2, Interesting)
I think the plans are for a bacteria or virus that traps carbon dioxide or uses photosynthesis to convert it to carbon and oxygen (lots of stuff that already does this, of course). There are also known bacteria that can split water into hydrogen and oxygen. Sorry, I have not tracked down any references...
The problem with 'eating up all the CO2' is certainly a consideration, but likely not as big a deal as it may sound since the organism would be designed (like existing ones) to reach a balance at an appropriate level, possibly related to an inability to survive with less than a certain amount of CO2 in its environment.
Re:Scared now (Score:3, Interesting)
In regards to this synthetic virus, my main question is whether or not the researchers have looked what happens to cells that get infected by the virus. You can't kill a virus like you can a bacterial cell. Basically, your body has to recognize the virus as foreign and make antibodies to kill it, which is why we have to get immunizations. That's a little frightening to me - the possibility that they've created somthing horrible lytic that no one has ever been exposed to.
Re:Chilling (Score:2, Interesting)
As for the technology, what should we expect? It was only a matter of time before this happened. Big-Pharm & Big-Chem have been funding this kind of research for decades and it's led to really useful technology like um... GM. At the end of the day all we have to fear is the majority vote of their shareholders - our new overlords.
Re:Viruses and weapons (Score:1, Interesting)
Could help stop biowarfare as well (Score:4, Interesting)
With a proven and consistent ability to recreate a virus from its known DNA sequence, the actual viruses themselves could be safely destroyed without impacting the ability to resurrect them in the future. As well, it's probably considerably harder to recreate a virus this way than to steal existing stock.
So while this opens the door to manufacturing viruses for biowarfare, it also makes it possible to destroy current stocks that might be stolen and used for such purposes.
Rainbow Six future scenario? (Score:5, Interesting)
Thinking about it in slightly different terms, all societies attempt to limit the proliferation of highly destructive weapons among their populace because the arbitrary nature of people would guarantee their arbitrary misuse. Imagine a world where people could obtain nuclear weapons as easily as a box of ammunition. We'd already all be dead.
This is what makes this particular story quite fear-inducing. When we arrive at the point where we can easily contruct very deadly weapons, particularly with the subtlety of viruses, there should be very strict regulation and government supervision. I can only hope there will be a worldwide treaty to that effect. After all, would you want someone engineering a virulent strain of airborne type 4 Ebola because he or she has a beef with a government's ideology?
The bizzare genome of Phi X 174 (Score:4, Interesting)
In fact, it's genome is so short that at first it confused researchers. It's genome is shorter than it should be. That is, there are fewer codons in the genome than there are amino acids in the virus's proteins. Normally, there would need to be a 1:1 codon:amino-acid ratio.
This lead researchers to the amazing discovery that phiX174 contains "genes within genes" and "overlapping genes". (Link to Genetic Map of phiX174) [neb.com] In several instances, one gene is entirely contained within another gene. In another, there are two genes (A and A*) that overlap with "reading frames" that are off by one.
This discovery challenges notions of what a gene is. With this knowledge, you can't say that a gene is simply a particular region of DNA.
These overlapping genes also call attention to the improbability of the evolution of phiX174. Commonly when a genetic mutation occurs, one base changes. This could affect one amino-acid in the protein for which the gene codes. In phiX174's case, a single base mutation could change 2 amino-acids in 2 proteins. This means that the evolution of these proteins is interdependent. That two functional proteins evolved in this manner is absolutely extraordinary.
Of course, now that it has evolved that way, it gives phiX174 an advantage of genetic economy. It takes less energy to maintain and reproduce a shorter genome. So phiX174 gets more bang for it's genetic buck by overlapping genes in this way.
Re:Should we really be doing things like this? (Score:5, Interesting)
Natural evolution is not slow for viruses; their genetic code does not have the copy-protection mechanisms of say mammals. That is why we have a new flu pop up every other year, or a SARS for that matter.
Anthrax, for example, implements a tricky chemical hack to breach animal cells and destroy them. Most animals are pretty defenseless against the special back door that antrax uses, and without it the anthrax bacteria would be no more harmful than a pimple. However, anthrax is a rather obscure organism that mostly lives in the dirt. The reason that animals haven't evolved a defense against its chemical attack is that it just doesn't spread that easily in a natural setting. If anthrax were contagious like a cold, animals would have evolved a defense against it long ago.
With all due respect I think you are contradicting yourself. When a patheogen spreads for natural or not so natural reasons, people may die. Some survive, the resistant genes thus become more common. There may even be mutations of strong resistance that start to spread.
When this process happens for natural reasons, you label it "evolving a defense", or "defending species having time to adapt". When it happens by an act of man, you think of it as man being caught "defenseless". Of course, in both cases the species start out as (relatively) defenseless, and end up with a better defense.
My whole point was that there seem to be no lab-made pahtogen worse than anything evolved in nature. As for spreading it by man, well, anthrax did get an assist by man. But the extent of that "outbreak" was miniscule next to the natural outbreaks that happen every year.
Unless somebody figures out how to make an artificial microbe that takes advantage of chemical processes that just aren't found in natural evolution. For example, the human body might not even be capable of attacking a hypothetical microbe that has a teflon or silicone-enhanced outer membrane.
Possibly. But then again, if such mechanisms were very successful, why did they not evolve for 4 billion years on a planet surface covered in silicon compounds. In general, it is very difficult for people in labs to compete with the lab which is our planet, and time-scales of millions or billions of years.
Tor
Re:duh.. I guess humans will do it themselves (Score:3, Interesting)
There are a great number of genetic markers which are overwhelmingly present in certain populations. This obviously doesn't apply to every individual, but say when 80% of what we call a race has a specific genetic condition, that is probably good enough for the next Hitler.
There are clearly different races (genetically) and until very recently humans were not as mobile as they currently are. Breeding was once a tribal concept and we live in a much different world than we were genetically created in. I hate to be the one to break this to you but people's appearance and the social concepts you speak of are based on their genetics. That's what makes some one 'black' and someone else 'white'.. it's the genes that dictate what social concept is applied. (or more exactly, our obserations about genetics that we have put names to)
Not as worrisome as it seems (Score:3, Interesting)
It is likely that any "supervirus" that could exist would have come into existence on it's own anyways. And some have; the bubonic plague, 1918 influenza, and to a lesser extent, aids. But the competition between viruses and hosts goes on and on in a cycle, with no final victor.
In fact, I would guess that any virus we could make would be a weakling compared to the viruses that evolve in the wild.
Cheers
Re:Scared now (Score:3, Interesting)
Theoretically, they should be able to do this with a mammal like a feline. Sequence the DNA, build a copy, and replace the DNA in a freshly fertilized egg, and it should grow up just fine. Though the complexity of the animal would add issues that I'm not educated enough to be aware of, certainly.
One interesting issue with this approach that was only recently brought to my attention is mitochondrial DNA. Mitochondria in cells carry their own DNA inherited from the organism's mother (they are descended from the mitochondria in the egg). Currently, it's not known what if any dependencies there might be between the organism's genetic makeup and the mitochondrial DNA. It's conceivable an organism with mismatched mitochondrial DNA might have severe flaws. Or it might not have any effect at all.
Re:Should we really be doing things like this? (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree that bio weapons get more attention than natural viruses because they involve someone doing something intentionally. But I don't think it makes sense. The way I see it the downside of my getting killed by an intentional attack is that I'm dead. The downside of my getting killed by a natural virus is that I'm dead. Whether or not anyone intended me to be dead doesn't modify that downside at all for me. If society is going to try to do some stuff to prevent me (and others) from becoming prematurely dead, it seems to me it would make sense to allocate more resources to things that are more likely to kill people.
I find it interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Viruses and weapons (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Viruses and weapons (Score:3, Interesting)
Because you sure sound like them.
Re:One of the advantages... (Score:2, Interesting)
Yes, cells mutate, and this is how they evolve. But genes don't "want" to mutate. (Well, genes don't really want anything, they're just complex molecules, but bear with me.)
Lets say you have a piece of DNA. A gene. Now, evolution says that genes which promote their existance will be more common than genes which do not. Obviously. This means that genes which promote their own existance will be more common.
Now, genes typically have many side effects. They might make a person a little taller, but at the same time it might increase the odds of cavities. It's a very chaotic system. Now, let's say you have two genes which are identical except for one difference: one prevents mutation of the gene, where the other one does not. Obviously, the one which prevents mutation will be more successful, because the other one will be changed to god-knows-what.
So evolution tends to favor genes which prevent mutation, although we still get enough for there to be new variation.