Taking a significant step toward the creation of man-made forms of life, researchers reported Thursday that they had manufactured the entire genome of a bacterium by painstakingly stitching together its chemical components.
While scientists had previously synthesized the complete DNA of viruses, this is the first time it has been done for bacteria, which are much more complex. The genome is more than 10 times as long as the longest piece of DNA ever previously synthesized.
The feat is a watershed for the emerging field called synthetic biology, which involves the design of organisms to perform particular tasks, such as making biofuels. Synthetic biologists envision being able one day to design an organism on a computer, press the “print” button to have the necessary DNA made, and then put that DNA into a cell to produce a custom-made creature.
“What we are doing with the synthetic chromosome is going to be the design process of the future,” said Dr. J. Craig Venter, the boundary-pushing gene scientist. He assembled the team that made the bacterial genome as part of his well publicized quest to create the first synthetic organism. The work was published online Thursday by the journal Science.
Brought to us by the Umbrella Corporation, no doubt.
They might have been able to do something considered stupendous but they made it out of stuff that God made. And He didn’t even get any credit. It is considered man-made.
Yes — Now if they had created the chemical components in the first place, then I’d be impressed!
We have been told here a number of times that all of this g enetic manipulation is publicity hunting. Do you still think so? The comments above indicate that we are not paying attention to the significance of what is taking place. Is Venter a publicity hound? I wouldn’t be surprised. Is his under taking idle science fiction? HOw can anyone continue to think this? He is merely one figure in a concentration of thousands of research scientists whose goal is gene splicing in some sense, while the US has no ethical underpinning to handle the significance of what is being done and what will surely happen. If you can insert new genes in a bacterium which will then replicate itself, what cell can you at last not alter? BUt you say it cannot yet replicate itself? To be sure; do you really believe that it will be impossible to do, or is it only a matter of time? Larry
[blockquote]Synthetic biologists envision being able one day to design an organism on a computer, press the “print†button to have the necessary DNA made, and then put that DNA into a cell to produce a custom-made creature. [/blockquote]
This is, of course, an indisputable case of [b]Intelligent Design[/b].
Marion really beat me to the argument I was going to make, re intelligent design.
Let us make a thought experiment. Some research scientists indeed find a way to alter our cells, using viruses as carriers, so that later viruses have a hard time breaking into them. This is one of the beneficial purposes of gene splicing. They bring these altered viruses carrying the altered RNA to, let us say, Africa, where Ebola and other deadly viruses are common. They insert these altered viruses in some member of a tribe (even if it is not legal to do so) and then they wait. The altered genes and the children as a result of those genes do not succumb as other members of the tribe do. Because they have an improved survival r ate, these genes are spread ever more widely.
Biologists and anthropologists hear of a tribe in Africa whose members are semi-immune to the deadly viruses that abound there. They may get sick, but they do not die. The take samples of all sorts from this tribe and discover that the genes have been altered to provide protection others do not have. What do they conclude? That they are watching evolution proceed as it has been predicted: Harsh selective pressure has been placed on a group such that only those who carry some protective mutation can survive, and their children are weeded out by the genes they carry. This is proof of evolution’s operation and their papers are so published.
But we know that the alteration is deliberate, and the result of intelligence and intent. The results in both cases are indistinguishable. And we may further argue: Are not both correct?
The argument is not foolproof because this is only one case. So we must speak, not of certainty, but of probability. And yet, as Thoreau has said, “Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when one finds a trout in milk,” and so here as well. The case above is credible because it is now possible, conceivable, and I submit inevitable. We will never attain certainty in such matters, precisely as the scientists are cautious never to assert certainty. Accordingly, if things equal to the same thing are equal to each other, I find intelligent design highly probable. Larry