Harvard Scientists on The Cusp of Synthetic Life

For good or ill we are entering a brave new world.

By John Lauerman

March 7 (Bloomberg) -- Harvard University scientists are a step closer to creating synthetic forms of life, part of a drive to design man-made organisms that may one day be used to help produce new fuels and create biotechnology drugs.

Researchers led by George Church, whose findings helped spur the U.S. human genome project in the 1980s, have copied the part of a living cell that makes proteins, the building blocks of life. The finding overcomes a major roadblock in making synthetic self-replicating organisms, Church said today in a lecture at Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The technology can be used to program cells to make virtually any protein, even some that don’t exist in nature, the scientists said. That may allow production of helpful new drugs, chemicals and organisms, including living bacteria. It also opens the door to ethical concerns about creation of processes that may be uncontrollable by life’s natural defenses.

“It’s the key component to making synthetic life,” Church said yesterday in a telephone call with reporters. “We haven’t made synthetic life and it’s not our primary goal, but this is a huge milestone in that direction.”

The work may be immediately helpful to companies such as Synthetic Genomics Inc., headed by J. Craig Venter, trying to make new organisms that perform specific tasks, such as converting buried coal into methane gas that’s easier to extract from the ground.

From Methane gas to Bio-technology the limits could be endless, but the again so might the risks:

Security Concerns

Artificial life and drugs that can’t be broken down by the body’s natural enzymes raise a number of serious concerns, said David Magnus, director of the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics.

As the tools of synthetic biology become easier to use, bioterrorists and criminals may attempt to exploit them, he said. Well-meaning scientists might also release potentially deadly organisms and chemicals into the environment.

“A number of proposals have been made about controlling access to this technology,” Magnus said in a telephone interview. “The synthetic biology community takes these issues seriously and are talking about what it will take to make sure we have effective oversight.”

The first artificial organisms are likely to be grown in highly controlled conditions, and would probably be unable to exist outside the laboratory, said Vanderbilt’s Forster.

I support technology but using the word probably in regards to anything involving synthetic life makes me a tad nervous.