Leading scientists have launched an international campaign to stop the creation of synthetic bacteria that could threaten life on earth.
Eminent researchers at a landmark gathering in Paris urged international action to prevent the emergence of so-called mirror life — manufactured microbes that they fear could overwhelm the immune defences of humans, other animals and plants.
The scale of the danger was still hard to predict but could affect “the preponderance of life as we know it today on this planet”, David Relman, a microbiologist and immunologist at Stanford University, told the Financial Times on the sidelines of the event. “There is a scenario in which a future mirror organism becomes a widely pervasive invasive species and displaces and disrupts many critical ecosystems across the planet — including our own,” he said. “We have to be concerned about the possibility of an extreme, potentially existential, threat.”
Scientists rush to stop mirror microbes that could threaten life on earth https://t.co/Smbs2Nt64o
— Financial Times (@FT) June 13, 2025