On May 20, 2010, the prestigious journal Science1 published a scientific paper that is certain to have a bigger effect on history than landing men on the moon or breaking the sound barrier. In that scientific paper, Craig Venter and his colleagues announced "the first self-replicating synthetic life form ever created."
You will recall that Venter, an American biologist, led one of the two scientific efforts that resulted in the first successful sequencing of the human genome in 2000. In 2005, he founded Synthetic Genomics, with the goal of creating man-made life forms and applying them to real-world problems. It took Synthetic Genomics just five years to achieve its first major breakthrough. How did Venters team do it?
They started by sequencing the genome of an existing bacterium, and storing the digitized sequence on a computer. Then, they used a computer-driven machine that assembles DNA sequences from amino acids to synthesize a genome nearly identical to that of the original organism. Finally, they inserted this synthetic genome into a different bacterium. With the new DNA on board, the recipient bacterium followed the instructions of that synthetic DNA, immediately transforming itself into the same type of cell as the donor.
From that moment forward, the organism began to reproduce billions of copies of itself. Although the recipient bacterium was not synthetic, once the synthetic DNA was on board and the cell began reproducing, within 20 or 30 generations, there was none of the original protein left in any of the progeny cells. At that point, it had become a legitimate man-made product.
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As Venter put it, "We call it synthetic because the cell is totally derived from a synthetic chromosome, made with four bottles of chemicals on a chemical synthesizer, starting with information in a computer."
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When the scientists were creating the synthetic DNA, they made a few changes. One of them was to include a so-called "watermark" in a section of non-essential DNA. The "digital watermark" clearly identifies the DNA as Synthetic Genomics intellectual property. And it clearly shows up in the proteins of the billions of new cells, indicating that they are synthetic, not naturally occurring.
This clearly represents a major milestone in the biological sciences. No longer are we restricted to observing nature. We are now able to control the very code that defines living things. Now, the race is on to define the synthetic biology game and dominate it.
As previously forecast in Trends,2 civilization is about to enter the so-called "Deployment phase" of the IT revolution. In the Deployment phase of each techno-economic revolution, the major opportunities shift from the core technology to its ability to fundamentally transform other economic sectors.
Synthetic biology, also called "artificial life," involves applying information technology to program and transform living things. In the process, we will be able to transform industries like agriculture, health care, and energy in the coming 25 years more than we have in the past 5,000 years.
To understand whats happening and why its happening now, consider the fact that the ability to decode and digitize genomes has been slightly more than doubling every year for the past quarter of a century. As a result, the power to extract genetic information from living systems has increased 100 million times in that scant 25 years. Similarly, the cost of synthesizing DNA has been falling at its own exponential rate.
Its difficult to overstate the importance of these developments. A BBC report on the implications of the first synthetic life form used phrases like "the new industrial revolution." Thats not far off. Synthetic life is to the computer revolution what computers were to electricity. We are now witnessing the very earliest stages of it.
Just to give a hint of whats in store, Venter and his partners are already working with pharmaceutical and oil companies, such as ExxonMobil, to build life forms that could produce fuel and medicines. Venters team is working on designing man-made algae that can take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and turn it into fuel.
But the most earth-shattering transformation may not be the recent reprogramming of an organism, but the more prosaic tasks involved in transforming synthetic biology from "pure research" into a "practical engineering discipline." From the day Crick and Watson determined the structure of the DNA molecule to the present, most of the work in biotech has been analogous to what Volta, Faraday, and Henry did with electricity.
Now, were finally moving into the era of standardization, pioneered by Edison, Tesla, and Steinmetz. That means using standardized, interchangeable parts rather than hand-crafted, one-off designs.
But instead of the vacuum tubes, coils, transistors, capacitors, and resistors, synthetic biologists will use well-defined segments of DNA, RNA, and proteins, as well as metabolites, such as lipids, amino acids, nucleotides, and carbohydrates, as their building blocks to produce a specific desired functionality in a biological system.
By assembling those biological components in specific ways, they will produce living devices that carry out biochemical reactions and that control the flow of information to make the necessary physical processes occur.
For example, researchers at MIT are already building a library of these devices, which they call BioBricks.4 Each BioBrick carries out a specific function like a computer chip. There is a registry for these standard parts that is expanding weekly.
The researchers assemble these BioBricks into what they call modules, which are likened to integrated circuits in computers. By connecting the modules together inside of living cells, they can potentially program those cells to carry out any function of which a living system is capable.
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This is possible because a living cell is a machine that carries out chemical reactions to sustain and reproduce itself. In the course of doing so, it follows a set of instructions contained in its DNA, and then manufactures substances such as proteins, which are its own building materials, and sugars, which are its fuel. Synthetic biologists take advantage of this existing electro-mechanical platform and then alter the instructions to suit their purposes. So, for example, a biologist at the University of California in Berkeley was able to program cells to produce artemisinin, an anti-malarial drug, at a much lower cost than conventional methods.5
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Not surprisingly, applications for patents on new life forms are already overwhelming the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. It seems like everyone is getting on the synthetic biology bandwagon. The Department of Energy is investing hundreds of millions of dollars in an effort to produce ethanol using artificial life forms.
In addition, a new organization called Synthetic Biology was recently started by students, faculty, and staff at MIT and Harvard.
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It has already evolved into a consortium of researchers and laboratories from various institutions who are working on engineering biological systems. They are scheduled to hold their next international conference to share information at Stanford in June 2011. The Synthetic Biology community has six stated aims:
- To create standard biological parts that can be used to build biological systems
- To develop the design methods and tools for the biological engineering lab
- To reverse-engineer existing biological parts so that they can be used as off-the-shelf devices
- To reverse-engineer a simple generic bacterium as a platform for many biological devices
- To define the minimal genome needed to sustain life
- To expand the genetic code to use more base pairs and increase its diversity
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The Synthetic Biology community now maintains the portal to MITs Registry of Standard Biological Parts. Anyone can participate, even those with no institutional affiliation. The Synthetic Biology website includes tutorials designed to let a complete novice get started on creating new BioBricks or even new life forms using simple laboratory equipment.
While the Synthetic Biology community launched at Harvard and MIT is one of the most active organizations in the field of synthetic biology, the field is rapidly crowding with other initiatives. For example, a research institute in Japan known as Riken announced its International Rational Genome-Design Contest in the June issue of the journal Nature.6 The first challenge is for contestants to genetically redesign thale cress, a small flowering plant, so that it can absorb and destroy formaldehyde, a common pollutant.
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Earlier this year, The New York Times7followed a team of students from the City College of San Francisco as they entered MITs International Genetically Engineered Machine Competition. None of them were even science majors. They just thought it would be fun to genetically engineer a cell to create a living battery.
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The emerging importance of this trend can be gauged not only by the media attention its receiving, but by the fact that the President recently called for a six-month review of synthetic biology by a panel of scientists. Meanwhile, according to Wired Science,8 Congress recently held hearings on the subject with the superstars of the field, including Venter, Jay Keasling of U.C. Berkeley, and Drew Endy from Stanford.
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Going forward, what is the future of this exciting new field? We offer the following six forecasts:
First, because of long development and regulatory approval cycles, especially in health care, the earliest economic winners will be companies making the tools needed for synthetic biology. As mentioned earlier, the decoding and digitizing of genomes is improving at break-neck speed. Those companies that stay ahead of the curve in this technology will reap huge profits as synthetic biology finds its practical applications. Shrewd investors will keep an eye on the winning hardware and software platforms. When the tools become so cheap that a high school student can do synthetic biology, there will be an explosion of demand for these machines.
Second, "do-it-yourself" synthetic biology will become commonplace in the 21st century. Think of a 21st century Steve Jobs with a gene machine. This will spawn thousands of start-up companies, potentially dwarfing the waves of innovation seen in computers and the Internet in recent decades. While companies like Exxon are focusing their efforts on creating bacteria that can produce diesel fuel, curious students at high schools and colleges around the world will be creating life forms that perform functions that no one can now imagine. Expect major game-changing innovations to come out of obscure countries. A hint at this potential was seen recently when a team of students from Slovenia won the BioBrick trophy at MIT in two out of three years.
Third, universities will soon offer degrees specifically in "synthetic biology." The first high-quality program in this emerging specialty will help that school attract the best students. MIT recently announced a graduate Synthetic Biology course offered for 2011 aimed at industry leaders in biotech, pharmaceutical, and chemical firms. The tuition for this single course is $3,250. Expect such courses to proliferate across the educational landscape, as engineering and life sciences departments cross-pollinate their faculty and staff. Already, we are seeing ads for post-doctoral researchers who are wanted at the Imperial College of London to work in the Center for Synthetic Biology and Innovation. Young people with a view toward the next big wave will be immersing themselves in this field for years to come.
Fourth, there will be a heated but ultimately futile backlash against synthetic biology, fueled by fear of the unknown. The new book Liberation Biology intelligently examines the history and outlook for "biotech Luddites." Case histories include a relief effort for India following a cyclone that struck in 1999. Corn and soy meal were sent from the U.S. to help starving people there, but India rejected the food because it came in part from genetically modified crops. Similarly in 2002, African nations rejected food aid even though millions were starving, because of the same fear of genetically modified crops. Unfortunately, its already clear that the reaction against synthetic organisms, no matter how beneficial, will be far more hysterical. Beyond the same fears associated with genetically modified foods, there will also be additional fears of laboratory accidents, the accidental release of synthetic organisms into the environment, and the proliferation of bioterrorism capabilities. In some ways, we are now in a position similar to the one we faced when the first atom bombs and nuclear power plants were developed. There are some real risks, but there is no way to put the genie back into the bottle. The surest course is to take all reasonable precautions and recognize that accidents and unforeseen events may very well happen. Fortunately, the very sequencing and synthesis technology that creates potential threats will also enable us to deal with them when they do.
Fifth, by 2040, synthetic life will merge with nanotechnology to create completely new engineering disciplines. The processes in biological systems are far more sophisticated and efficient than man-made mechanical processes. Even the dazzling inner workings of computers cant compare to the complexity and elegance of living systems. By harnessing the power of biology and combining it with the special properties of nanotech systems, inventions we can barely dream of now will become commonplace tomorrow. For example, bio-synthetic robots that can patrol the bloodstream for invading organisms or for harmful substances, such as cholesterol and free radicals, will revolutionize medicine. This will raise a host of new moral and ethical issues revolving around such matters as "designer children" and the potential of people to achieve a virtually endless life span. It will also raise questions about who should have access to these technologies.
Sixth, just as computers are enabling a great leap forward in biology, biology itself will ultimately transform many aspects of computing. As reported in the Wall Street Journal,10 scientists are already using DNA experimentally to make computing devices. For example, researchers at Duke University have created self-assembling logic circuits from DNA. With conventional computers running up against the molecular limits of materials such as silicon, engineers will increasingly turn to biological systems as they work to miniaturize extremely complex systems and carry out functions at a very high rate of speed. These super-fast computers will be "grown", they will be self-replicating; and they will be extremely cheap and ubiquitous.
References List : 1. Science Online, May 20, 2010, "Creation of a Bacterial Cell Controlled by a Chemically Synthesized Genome," by J. Craig Venter, et. al. ⓒ Copyright 2010 by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. All rights reserved. http://www.sciencemag.org 2. Trends, April 2010, "A New Golden Age... When People Least Expect It." ⓒ Copyright 2010 by AudioTech Business Book Summaries, Inc. All rights reserved. http://www.trends-magazine.com 3. To access the BBC report on the synthetic life form, visit their website at: http://news.bbc.co.uk 4. For more information about the MIT Registry of Standard Biological Parts, visit their website at: http://partsregistry.org 5. For more information about research to create a low-cost antimalarial drug, visit the University of California at Berkeley website at: http://berkeley.edu 6. Nature Online, June 2, 2010, "Synthetic-Biology Competition Launches," by David Cyranoski. ⓒ Copyright 2010 by Nature Publishing Group, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved. http://www.nature.com 7. The New York Times, February 14, 2010, "Do-It-Yourself Genetic Engineering," by Jon Mooallem. ⓒ Copyright 2010 by The New York Times Company. All rights reserved. http://www.nytimes.com 8. Wired Science, May 27, 2010, "Congress, Obama Take Sudden Interest in Synthetic Biology," by Alexis Madrigal. ⓒ Copyright 2010 by Conde Nast. All rights reserved. http://www.wired.com 9. Liberation Biology: The Scientific and Moral Case for the Biotech Revolution by Ronald Bailey is published by Prometheus Books. ⓒ Copyright 2005 by Ronald Bailey. All rights reserved. 10. The Wall Street Journal, May 13, 2010, "They Walk. They Work. New DNA Robots Strut Their Tiny Stuff," by Robert Lee Hotz. ⓒ Copyright 2010 by Dow Jones and Company. All rights reserved. http://online.wsj.com
