BS: First new artificial life form created

Subject: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: katlaughing
Date: 06 Oct 07 - 11:31 PM

Interesting stuff!

"Head for the hills: first new artificial life form created
October 6 Doug Aamoth

"Venter Ready for an ethics debate? DNA researcher Craig Venter "has "built a synthetic chromosome out of laboratory chemicals and is poised to announce the creation of the first new artificial life form on Earth."

"The new species is made from an artificial chromosome constructed by a team of 20 leading scientists led by Nobel laureate Hamilton Smith. The chromosome is "381 genes long and contains 580,000 base pairs of genetic code."

""It's based on the DNA sequence for a bacterium known as "Mycoplasma genitalium" that's been whittled down to its most basic form to include only what it needs to support life. The synthetic chromosome has been named "Mycoplasma laboratorium" and has been, get this, watermarked with ink so that it can be easily identified out in the real world.

"The chromosome is transplanted into a living host cell where it then takes control of the cell, effectively changing it into a different species. So the life form itself isn't completely 100% artificial, per se, but since its genetic makeup is based on an artificially created DNA structure that controls the cell, it can be categorized as man-made since DNA is the building block from which all life is created and maintained.

"So what does this mean for you? That all depends.

"Venter's claim is that bacteria could be created to soak up carbon dioxide, which could help in the fight against global warming. Most people would agree that's a good thing. New life-saving drugs could also be artificially created — a good thing as well. However, artificially-created bacteria could also be used to make things like biological weapons.

"The sky's the limit, actually, according to bioethics expert Pat Mooney. He claims that Venter has created a "chassis on which you could build almost anything. It could be a contribution to humanity such as new drugs or a huge threat to humanity such as bio-weapons."

"While Craig Venter's intentions seem benevolent at this point, something that might make people a bit nervous is that he's applied to patent the synthetic bacterium. The idea that something that can be used to create just about anything else can be legally owned and controlled by a single human being is terrifying at best.

"Patent reform, anyone?"

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Amos
Date: 06 Oct 07 - 11:39 PM

The patent system is deeply in need of reform even without the challenges presented by bio-engineering.

If what I have read is true Venter's invention is like the invention of the transistor. Anything can be made of it, and it can be applied for great betterment or great dreck, to enhance life or multiply its mediocrity; or even to make it worse.

A

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: katlaughing
Date: 06 Oct 07 - 11:41 PM

Reminds me of the Dr. Who we watched last night.

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 12:33 AM

Premature announcement by the Guardian-

The J. Craig Venter Institute at Rockville, MD, team headed by Hamilton Smith, who shared the 1978 Nobel Prize for Medicine, is the site of the research; they have a branch in La Jolla, CA.

Today, a Venter spokeswoman declined to confirm any breakthrough. "The Guardian is ahead of themselves on this," Heather Kowalski told the AFP.
"We have not achieved what some have speculated we have in synthetic life," Kowalski said. "When we do so there will be a scientific publication and we are likely months away from that."
In 2006, the Institute filed for patent on the organism, claiming ownership of a set of essential genes and a synthetic "free-living organism that can grow and replicate." The patent would be valid in the United States and about 100 countries. Experts said that the Venter Institute probably had not achieved a fully functioning organism at the time of filing.

The project is partially financed by the U. S. Dept. of Energy in the hopes that it could lead to the creation of a new environmentally fuel.
On the verge announcement

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: heric
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 12:59 AM

The J. Craig Venter Institute is a nonprofit. That entity holds the patent referenced in publicity. I can understand the DOE funding its research with my money. I don't really understand the world of patent profits, though, or the other funding entity, the privately held Synthetic Genomics. Venter is the Founder, Chairman, CEO, and Co-Chief Scientific Officer of the latter. BP just invested an "undisclosed sum," according to press releases from this past summer. The President used to be the director of the Office of Biological and Environmental Research at the Department of Energy's Office of Science.

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 03:30 AM

Yesterday I watched both versions of 'Invasion of the Bodysnatchers'... this feels awfully similar (but I readily admit, by no stretch of the imagination am I a scientist).

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: greg stephens
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 04:51 AM

Surely a genetically modified existing life form, not artificial life at all. Complete journalistic twaddle.

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: GUEST,Richi
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 06:17 AM

Does it mean now the worse dream of Zombie come true???

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Linda Kelly
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 05:54 PM

'genetically modified existing life form' -surely this is a description of a Yorkshireman?

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Peace
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 05:58 PM

The first experiment didn't work out very well . . . .

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: catspaw49
Date: 07 Oct 07 - 07:00 PM

Actually Peace, that's Crappo, a failed teenage mutant ninja turtle and he really wasn't artificial but simply the result of a slug fucked by a warthog. Sorrowfully he had less intelligence than either parent.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 08 Oct 07 - 06:30 PM

'Mycoplasma genitalium'? Oh dear! Does it do something nasty to your personal bits and bobs, by any chance? And does artificial Myco. gen. do something even worse? Not sure I want to know ... cross your legs everyone!

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Charley Noble
Date: 08 Oct 07 - 08:41 PM

"The chromosome is transplanted into a living host cell where it then takes control of the cell, effectively changing it into a different species."

What fun! Let's release it all over the world and see what hap......

Cheerily,
Chaley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 08 Oct 07 - 08:50 PM

Already got to Charley (Chaley?)

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: RangerSteve
Date: 09 Oct 07 - 01:08 PM

This is nonsense. I've been creating new life forms in my refrigerator for years. I bet there's a Zip-loc container in the back that's brewing something right now.

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Oct 07 - 09:29 AM

"So what does this mean for you? That all depends.

Besides all the other ethical and legal conundrums, this shows that it is both possilbe and likely that DNA has crossed the species border many times in our ancestral past.

Did you know that people have segments of feline DNA but it was dismissed as junk DNA and coincidence?

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: MMario
Date: 10 Oct 07 - 09:35 AM

it is both possilbe and likely that DNA has crossed the species border many times in our ancestral past.

yup. in fact it is current theory that mitochondria are the evolutionary descendents of a parasitic life form that invaded other cells back when everything was single cellular.

Other examples - mules; ligers, tigrons, (the latter two are both fertile) - and in plants there are thousands of examples.

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Oct 07 - 09:54 AM

Yes but I'm talking about vastly different species becoming entwined.

I've always been fascinated how the resemblance of a human embryo looks identical to many different species' embryos in various stages of development. We look just like chickens at one point.

Subject: RE: BS: First new artificial life form created
From: robomatic
Date: 10 Oct 07 - 10:41 PM

I took a swig of that chromosome juice and now I'm my own grandpa!