Top scientists met in secret to discuss creating the first artificial humans
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Synthetic biology opens the door for custom designed humans whose only parents are a computer. Scientists can already produce viable artificial human eggs and sperm but earlier this month they took everything one step further when an invite only group of about 150 experts convened...
Inside Ginkgo, the gene factory where robots help make new weird synthetic organisms
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Creating new lifeforms sounds like fun and they taste great too. Raising glasses of genetically modified beer, the synthetic biologists at Ginkgo Bioworks celebrated the launch of their new automated lab last month and you can take a virtual tour of their facility here. By...
Worlds first designer baby is born in Mexico and has three parents
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Now that we have access to advanced gene editing techniques, such as CRISPR, it is inevitable that we will progressively use these technologies to edit the human genome and create genetically altered human beings. The world’s first baby to be born from a new...
Researchers cut HIV genes out of living cells using CRISPR
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF One day researchers hope they can do the same in Humans. In a world first, scientists led by Kamel Khalili, director of the Comprehensive NeuroAIDS Center at Temple University, report in the journal Gene Therapy that they have for the first time successfully eliminated...
Storing the worlds information in a shoe box, Microsoft buys millions of strands of DNA
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Is Microsoft building its own team of super sales people? No, it’s all about storage. Very dense, very long term storage. Your next computer might store its data on DNA and while this concept is nothing new Microsoft is spending millions of dollars on buying...
Feeding the world with lab grown foods gets closer
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF This could cause a conundrum – is lab made meat considered vegan? From an environmental and humanitarian point of view it’s easy to argue the case for lab produced food. In order to feed the same global population lab grown foods would consume 55% less energy to...
Geneticists are creating a new form of life that is resistant to all known viruses
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Geneticists are now capable of creating new forms of life that are completely resistant to all known viruses. Geneticists have made a step forward in ‘recoding’ the genome as we know it, replacing 62,214 DNA base pairs in a synthetic E. coli genome and...
We are entering the First Age of De-Extinction
This might complicate our which came first question… There have been five mass extinction events since the Earth formed, the last being the death of the dinosaurs and many people believe that we are now in the Sixth Age of Extinction but the difference this time is that this event...
Uzbekistan uses genetic testing to discover the next Olympians
Uzbekistan hunts for natural born winners To spot future olympians it’s common practice to wait to see if youngsters are actually good at any given activity but the central Asian country of Uzbekistan is testing the genes of children as young as 10 to try and find future champion athletes. The nation...
Rio 2016 introduces tests to hunt for genetically modified athletes
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF In the not so distant future drugs cheats will give way to gene cheats, and WADA plans on catching them all – eventually. Mention Erythropoietin to most people on the street and they won’t have any idea what you’re talking about. It took over...
China trials a CRISPR vaccine for Cancer on humans
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Researchers around the world are racing to be first to create a viable cure for Cancer, now a team in China might beat the US to the punch. Medicine, and the way that we treat disease, is changing and nowhere is that more self...
Nature, the world’s new factory
Nature has always been more efficient at making products than Man but now we’re harnessing it for our own ends Most people would agree we still have much to learn from nature. Nature is vastly more efficient at recycling and reusing matter than humans have been. The whole field and...
Bionic leaf could revolutionise energy and manufacturing
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF A revolution in the making, the Bionic Leaf ushers in a new era of biomanufacturing. Harvard University has created a “bionic leaf” that converts solar energy into a liquid fuel. The work, a proof of concept in an exciting new field called biomanufacturing, is the fruit...
HIV defeats revolutionary gene editing technology CRISPR
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Questions are appearing over CRISPR’s ability to cure HIV. HIV can defeat efforts to cripple it with CRISPR gene editing technology, researchers say and furthermore the very act of editing which involves snipping at the virus’s genome may actually introduce mutations that help it to...
Generation Z, the first immortal generation?
It’s a matter of When, not If we solve Death and Generation Z could be the first generation to experience Immortality in their lifetimes. Today we can reverse paralysis, restore sight, print hearts, eliminate disease and transfer memories, age is a quirk of genetics, nanotech is a game changer and only Darwinism...
Scientists turn to gene editing to reverse blindness in humans
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Scientists are using the revolutionary gene editing technology CRISPR, dubbed the “Genesis Engine,” to treat, cure, and reverse a whole range of medical conditions that range from Cancer and HIV to blindness and inherited syndromes and the results so far are staggering. Hailed as...
