As synthetic biology has the potential to create both a clean solution to the world’s energy needs and a new era in bioterrorism, it must be well regulated, says Michael O’Toole

As synthetic biology has the potential to create both a clean solution to the world’s energy needs and a new era in bioterrorism, it must be well regulated, says Michael O’TooleIn May 2010 front pages of newspapers around the world were captured by breathless claims of a revolution in synthetic biology. Scientists at the J Craig Venter Institute had inserted artificially created DNA into the cell of a stripped down bacterium, creating a viable unique organism.

The process is similar to rebuilding a car from the chassis up using a different engine and modified parts.

This success reveals how adept scientists and industry are becoming at manipulating life at a cellular level. This may perhaps pave the way for breakthroughs in advanced biofuels, and new medicines attacking some of humanity’s most basic and enduring diseases.

ExxonMobil’s $600m backing for algae-based fuel is only the most famous example of big business investing in the emerging science.

However, the same fundamental principles creating tomorrow’s world-saving wonder-fuels are, in theory, equally capable of creating new terror weapons.

Laboratory threats

These would not be built in some vast, expensive and relatively regulateable nuclear facility but on a laboratory desktop.

Interest in the governance and regulation of the synthetic biology industry is understandably on the increase. India, for example, is currently pushing through with plans for a new biotechnology regulatory authority, in part destined to govern the research, import, manufacture and use of organisms. For its part, the EU recently concluded Synbiosafe, the first project in Europe to research the safety and ethical aspects of synthetic biology.

The US has been the most prominent in pushing for action. A special commission is shortly due to report 19 recommendations for the field to the Obama administration, but some of their recommendations are already published.

There are new guidelines for US businesses involved in providing DNA sequences to order for clients around the world. They are now being asked to screen both what they are selling and to whom they are selling it. This is with an eye to preventing it falling into the hands of rogue states and hate groups – in short, to crack down on a new era of mail-order bioweapons.

These guidelines may be less effective than what the industry itself has been achieving through its own brand of self regulation. Competing industry groups have already been at work on minimising the threat with arguably even more comprehensive methods. Meanwhile scientists in the field have long been pushing for greater debate over governance.

Furthermore, it’s questionable whether such guidance can always be successful, as the potential threat implicit in a set of genes isn’t always apparent. Nonetheless, greater governance and ethical scrutiny seems inevitable for an industry whose scientific possibilities seem destined to escape the laboratory. Where, how, and by whom is, for the moment, still open for debate.

The DIYbio moment

Enter a new player. While big business has long understood the opportunities, what’s less well known is the grassroots DIYbio movement. Otherwise known as “genehackers”, these individuals are taking the science into their own hands, experimenting at home with second-hand lab equipment bought off the internet. According to the group’s website – DIYbio.org – there are local meetings, experiments and amateur scientists on five continents.

Spiritually, they seem closest to the 1970s garage tinkerers that spawned IT businesses such as Apple. Whether they will be able to achieve such corporate heights, or whether they even want to, is unknown but it’s clear that the possibilities of what they can achieve are increasing day by day.

Observers in the industry don’t see a danger rising from this community – yet. There remain too many technological issues would need to be overcome for an individual’s work to be taken too seriously. The threat that something could survive and thrive in the outside world are too remote, experts say.

Making attacks easier?

However, as Edward You, supervisory special agent with the US FBI’s weapons of mass destruction directorate, remarks on the FBI’s website: “You’re having the barrier of entry to do something mischievous, or actually outright nefarious, getting lower, so individuals or groups will be able to conduct potential harm more so than before.”

Nonetheless specialists in the field are watchful. In the US the FBI is speaking with a broad spectrum of industry, academia, and the growing amateur community. Their strategies are relatively collaborative, even informative. This open approach is significantly different to that, say, involved in the atomic and nuclear energy industries.

This seems to indicate that the biotechnology genie cannot be put back in the bottle. The best that can be done is to reduce the risks by engaging the right people, early, with the right governance.

Michael O'Toole is a freelance writer with an interest in science and a background in sustainability issues at large corporations.