Writing Genetic Code 190
An anonymous reader writes "The Globe and Mail is reporting on another group of researchers delving into the field of 'synthetic biology.' The project stemming from the efforts of two biology labs in British Columbia and Maryland is attempting to create the first synthetic life form. From the article: 'The project is being spearheaded by U.S. scientist Craig Venter, who gained fame in his former job as head of Celera Genomics, which completed a privately-owned map of the human genome in 2000. Dr. Venter, 59, has since shifted his focus from determining the chemical sequences that encode life to trying to design and build it: "We're going from reading to writing the genetic code," he said in an interview.'" This is certainly not the first group to venture into this territory.
Problems? (Score:5, Insightful)
Recolada (Score:4, Insightful)
If God didn't mean us to create life he would smite these people straight out, so we can kill that objection, BTW.
The interesting part is going to be how they actually turn their new genome into a living bacteria. They're basically going to have to either assemble the first one from whole cloth or trick some other microbe into producing what they want.
And even if we can make these things perform useful functions, how to make sure they don't die out from lack of an evolutionary niche or mutate and become pathological?
Is it really that synthetic? (Score:1, Insightful)
The DNA is only a small portion of the cell. If they want to make a whole synthetic organism, they're going to have to make the other organelles and various membranes--a task I would imagine would be just as difficult as building the DNA.
Sure, this is a big deal. But I don't think you can call an organism synthetic if all you are doing is injecting synthetic DNA into a pre-existing organism.
Re:Problems? (Score:3, Insightful)
THE HAZARDS OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENTAL GENE MODIFICATION
Read the full document here [gene-watch.org]...
It's rather scary to allow certain things from happening at least in my opinion. I'm all for stem cell research, just about anything to better man, but I don't see how attempting to create life from scratch is something worthwhile. Especially with all of the cons associated with it. What would happen on a worst case (Resident Evil) scenario. Its possible no one would be able to handle certain situations. Why bother putting us there. How does creating a "species" help us again?
With all of the balances and checks in this world (food chain on down), something like this has the capability of going completely wrong
Re:Recolada (Score:3, Insightful)
If god didn't mean for people to lie, commit adultery, and murderer, he'd just smite them too, right?
That being said, genetics is a tool. Like any tool, it can be used for good purposes, or bad purposes (ok, almost any tool - it's kind of hard to abuse a Nerf bat - I know, I've tried).
Re:Unlikely, but exciting if they pull it off (Score:2, Insightful)
Another commenter mentioned that bacteria can't "mate". It was in quotes because its not really mating like we'd think of it; basically, some bacteria, when nearing death by starvation, will attach to another bacteria and inject its RNA or DNA strand into the other bacteria, producing an "offspring" that is a fusion of the two "parents" with the injector being the "male" and injectee the "female".
I'm not even a bio major, I'm an engineering major. They teach this stuff in Bio 1.
Re:Extremely interesting.... (Score:3, Insightful)
The way I see it, the existing bacteria is just a DNA-compiler.
If I write a C-compiler in C, I need to use an existing C-compiler to build it. The old compiler, like the bacteria, is just a tool used in the process - no one would claim I didn't really write my compiler just because I had to bootstrap it off an existing one.
On the other hand, if I just took gcc and modified it extensively, I couldn't claim that I created it myself.
Building with DNA (Score:5, Insightful)
As I understand it, the current state-of-the-art in terms of programming DNA is basic logic gates that still tend to lose coherence when connected together. Once this is accomplished (best guess, 3-4 years from now to work out the basic science), all of the sophisticated tools and techniques developed by the IT community over the last decade(s) can be rapidly applied, and that goal of design/build to spec will become possible.
hehe (Score:0, Insightful)
One has to draw the line somewhere (Score:2, Insightful)
Genetic Engineering < Synthetic Biology (Score:1, Insightful)
That's the genetic engineering approach. Find a gene and splicing it into bacteria. That's like finding a chasm and splicing in the Empire State building to bridge it. It might work, but designing a bridge to span the chasm will probably work better. That's synthetic biology.
I have doubts as to the likelihood of success using present science; in twenty years, perhaps it will be possible, but today it's really casting about in the dark. Even something as elemental as a bacteria is an incredibly complex thing, with a sophisticated genome and complex organelles working in biochemical harmony to reproduce, to "mate" by conjoining with other bacteria, and to adapt and thrive in a very wide variety of conditions.
I'd be more inclined to think that cost is the restricting factor today. It costs a ton of money to have a gene sequence assembled, but the price to do so is dropping exponentially if what I read on the subject back in January was true.
Re:Unlikely, but exciting if they pull it off (Score:2, Insightful)
Eventually AIDS, if for some reason we Never find a cure, will probably just run its course. Humans would adapt or AIDS would evolve to be non-lethal, like in chimps. Or it will at least level off.
Re:Is it really that synthetic? (Score:1, Insightful)
Yes, but you can't then say you created your own computer.
Re:Compiler? (Score:2, Insightful)
A good joke is funnier if it's true, but God help you if you make shit up and the details are off.