So, I'm assuming everyone has read/heard about this development? I personally think they are going out on a limb by calling it 'synthetic life'.

They synthesized DNA, and implanted it within an already functioning cell, hijacking its functions to carry out those of the implanted DNA. Am I the only one that doesn't think of that as 'synthetic life?'

My main argument is this: While building DNA piece by piece is an amazing feat in of itself, and should be recognized as such, it's not the same as building the whole cell. This is the same as saying " I just programmed the perfect piece of software... " but having no hardware to run it on. The hardware (the cell) is still being borrowed from nature.

Now, when they build an artificial cell, and include the manufactured genome, I will be impressed, and probably a bit scared.

Reference (For those unaware): http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/30/opinion/30sun3.html

synthetic "synthetic" whatever

No I have not heard about this

This is so cool.

I think you need to read up on the definition of synthesis.

It's not like they proclaimed abiogenesis, they just claimed synthetic.

I think the big problem here is the media is making it sound like abiogenesis, which technically would be synthetic life. However, I would imagine the genome to be the most difficult part of the life process, isn't software usually more difficult than hardware?

i had heard briefly about this. this seems at the same time really cool/possibly really important and a little bit, frightening? i think i have probably read one too many michael crichton books.
at any rate a useful apliation is still probably a ways off.
heres another pretty good article on it >>> www.newsweek.com

I read this article in the most recent edition of Wired Magazine & I thought that they made an interesting point regarding the way in which the media interprets science & how science may be as much to blame as they are. I can think of very little science that's covered by the media that they actually get right (outside of medicine).

Not frightening, awesome. This means we're one step further in creating cells with the correct molecular compounds on the cell membrane so they can be implanted into humans without them rejecting the cell.

Diabetes patients, rejoice! Soon you will have your own alpha- and beta-cells again!

Almost sounds like a movie thats coming out..

The media is hyping this up like crazy. We've been doing this kind of thing for years, just on a smaller scale (for anyone with bio knowledge, think plasmids). The major contribution is that they developed a clever way to construct genome-scale DNA strands, not that they created "synthetic life" (the way laymen think of it, anyway).

BIOSHOCK?

No.

Well, yeah, but there is a huge difference between DNA recombinant technology and actually creating a strand of DNA.

Not really. All you have to do to create a whole new strand is keep recombining it until the original is gone.

Or anyone with an auto-immune disorder could rejoice. Think of what it could do for kids diagnosed with rhuematoid arthritis?

Sounds similar to how a Virus reproduces. Granted most people wouldnt define a virus as 'Alive', since the only life function it does execute is reproduction.

While the medical advancements would be incredible, like anything in this world, people bastardize it for use as a weapon. From the Science channel special, Venter himself said there are potential plans to map Small Pox, and thus finally destroy the last remaining copies/samples of it. Which is all well and good, until someone gets the plans, mass produces and distributes it...

But, at the same time, according to him the Small Pox virus isn't much different from the rest of the Pox strains, and could easily be modified to be just as bad.

I would think the good could outweigh the bad, as in most cases, those who try to use it for harmful purposes generally don't have the funding of those who use it for practical means. So any threat could be quickly countered by the same means of genetic manipulation for a vaccine.

I think the bad is definitely going to outweigh the bad. I'm doing some doom-scenario here: We can already simulate human cells, and now we can even construct DNA. This means that you'll need to let a computer run for a moderate amount of time until it comes up with a cell that reproduces fast and destroys the host cell's DNA.
Done, mass extinction.

Alright, I did make it sound a little more easy than it is, but I have lost my faith in humanity when it comes to scientific breakthroughs since the atom bomb, or the laser, or rocket propulsion, or...

Well, you're overlooking a vast amount of tech that's used for good as well.

Not sure what your point is exactly, but they used plasmids and yeast recombinant DNA technology to create the "artificial" genome. When you say "actually creating a strand of DNA", I'm assuming you are referring to in vitro synthesis of DNA, which is exciting as well but has no real relevance to the study under discussion besides the fact that they commissioned the in vitro synthesis of a **** ton of ~1 kb gene fragments (to make up the ~1 Mb artificial chromosome) for use in the aforementioned plasmids. This (in vitro DNA synthesis) is a commercialized technique that anyone can use (ex. Blue Heron Biotechnology, http://www.blueheronbio.com/).

Oh, I'm sorry, then I am completely misinformed. I thought they actually created a strand of DNA base by base. Without the use of any plasmids, injected into a living cell while removing the cell's own DNA. Maybe I should research some stuff before I open my mouth

Sort of, but only because the tools and processes for developing software are less mature.

In before Geth

When you write software you can get away with a lot of **** the hardware folks can't. With modern HDLs it's almost the same job, just harder.

Biological 'hardware' is tough too, because you'd have to build the first cell molecule-by-molecule and we don't have the technology to do that yet. Plus DNA is really hardware, too.

I was sort of replying to AoEJedi. Software is only harder due to lack of maturity or ignorance. When you get down to it, the best software developers probably have an easier time than the best hardware engineers.

I understand that DNA is technically a physical thing, but it's the driver for the cell at least. The only thing really telling it what to be and how to behave.

I guess that makes sense, that building things on a molecular level is a bit too complex for us now, and DNA isn't so tough because it's somewhat easy to just grow custom made genomes in cultures.

Software developers do have an easier time, definitely. For hardware, if you screw up your entire product line's toast. Like the Pentium FPU bug, or the Phenom TLB race condition. If software crashes it's not usually the end of the world. Really important, well-designed devices have hardware interlocks to prevent the worst of software bugs.

I'd say that software is easier because it's so immature. Intel's using model checking to verify correctness. We have,... what, basic unit and integration testing with no real means of automation?