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embers of the synthetic biol-ogy community

met this past Julyin Zurich, Swit-

zerland. Synthetic Biology 3.0, as theconference was called, celebrated thediscipline’s continued vigor, alongwith Europe’s entry into what hadbeen a largely U.S. subject.

Prominent on the conference agendawere 10 talks devoted to public policy,four of which involved biosecurity,and an entire session devoted to eth-ics. Speakers agreed that the field’ssocial and ethical consequences wouldbe as far-reaching as the science. In-deed, most scientists agree that syn-thetic biology is (or at least could be)something new under the sun. Tenyears ago, genetic engineers had tocut and paste DNA from existing or-ganisms to make new drugs such ashuman growth hormone or syntheticinsulin. Today, scientists and engineerscan create DNA from scratch.

The challenge for synthetic biolo-gists is to exploit this power not just to

mimic nature’s designs but also to cre-ate new ones. So far, most of the resultsare proof of principle—organisms that

oscillate with clock-like regularity orgenerate odors. But synthetic biologyis developing rapidly. Industrial-scale

programs for building organisms thatsecrete precursors for anti-malarialdrugs and turn sunlight into energyare under way. Even more ambitiousplans—for example, organisms thathunt down and attack cancer cells—areon the horizon.

Inevitably, there is a dark side tosuch technological developments. Justas personal computers brought com-puting power to the masses, syntheticbiology methods reduce the cost anddifficulty in genetic engineering andthus may present ways to slash thecost of making biologically based,genetically engineered weapons thatare vaccine resistant or combine tox-ins from different organisms. Fur-thermore, synthetic biologists havealready shown how terrorists couldobtain life forms that now exist onlyin carefully guarded facilities, suchas polio and 1918 influenza samples.Finally, synthetic biology’s efforts toreprogram life have raised concerns

in some quarters that the technologycould one day be used to make radi-cally new weapons, such as patho-gens that could be narrowly targetedtoward populations with known ge-netic susceptibilities.

Synthetic biologists have been debat-ing “precautionary measures” againstmisuse since at least 2004. Building onthe example of software engineers, whoturned their World Wide Web Consor-tium conventions into a surprisingly

effective governance body, synthetic bi-ologists have explored using the field’sannual conventions to do the same for

biosecurity. Yet the community strug-gles to identify and pursue the beststrategy for guarding against misuse of synthetic biology.

Many times before, science has in-spired remarkable hope for humanwelfare, and remarkable fears. Duringthe Cold War, scientists could do noth-ing to stop the Soviet Union and theWest from developing nuclear weap-ons, despite individual efforts. Everypolicy lever that mattered—funding,regulation, treaties—required govern-ment action. The terrorist threat andthe emergence of new nuclear pow-ers changed that calculus. To succeedtoday, terrorists and some nations willneed help (most likely, unwittingly)from science’s decentralized, free-wheeling, globalized networks. TheA. Q. Khan network, which sold nu-clear technology to Iran, Libya, andNorth Korea, was in many ways theprototype for this scenario.

The science has changed, too. The

twentieth century saw the emergenceof the scientific pursuits that will domi-nate this century: molecular biologyand its technological cousin, biotech-nology. Biotechnology has alreadycollapsed the traditional distinctionbetween basic research and products.Security experts rightly worry that bio-tech laboratories could similarly createorganisms that are immediately usefulas weapons, obviating the multibillion- dollar testing and development cycles

Stephen M. Maurer is an adjunct professor

at the University of California-Berkeley’s

Goldman School of Public Policy and 

director of its IT and Homeland Security

Project. Laurie Zoloth is director of the

Center for Bioethics, Science and Society

and professor of medical ethics and hu-

manities at Northwestern University.

BY STEPHEN M. MAURER & LAURIE ZOLOTH

synthesizing biosecurityProtecting the public from the risks of synthetic biology depends on the

scientific community’s will, capacity, and commitment to regulate itself.

M

Opinions

Vol. 63, No. 6, pp. 16-18

DOI: 10.2968/063006004

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had identified, the declaration also an-nounced that a working group wouldbuild second-generation screening toolsand urged members to stop doing busi-ness with companies that failed to screensequenced DNA orders. Later that sum-mer, the Federation of American Scien-

tists hosted a workshop that began de-signing the proposed software. By fall,industry had formed a collaborationcalled the International Consortium forPolynucleotide Synthesis as an umbrellaorganization for moving the agenda for-ward, and a German company calledEntelechon had begun work on a relat-ed open-source software project.

This is where things stood in July2007 when the scientists and engi-neers met in Zurich. While some at the

meeting were clearly unaware of ear-lier discussions, groups from MIT, the J. Craig Venter Institute, and newlyemerging European communities

reported new work to identify ideasfor self-regulation and guidelines. Or-ganizers also reached out by invitingan activist group that had protestedthe previous meeting to speak at aplenary session. Finally, conferenceorganizers held an event that gave

local citizens a chance to questionthe nature, goals, and meaning of thisemerging discipline.

Talk, of course, is no good unlessit leads to action. Here, too, the Zur-ich meeting provided at least limitedgrounds for optimism. While no onetried to resurrect the idea of using theconferences as a governance body, a fewmembers spoke of creating an entirelynew professional society to fill the gap.More importantly, members were clearly

making progress on second-generationscreening tools. The most concrete re-marks came from industry, when Ralf Wagner, the head of Germany’s Geneart,

described his company’s detailed effortsto implement biosecurity screening assimply “the cost that should be involvedin doing this.” It is likely that the com-munity will eventually press all compa-nies to follow his lead. A four-universityconsortium (Berkeley, Northwestern,

Duke, and Maryland) is also developingan online portal where synthetic biolo-gists can get advice before embarkingon “experiments of concern.”

One of the open research questionsfor policy makers and bioethicistswho study emerging science remains:What is the proper academic role of the “stranger” discipline—such as law,moral philosophy, or political theory—when scholars of these fields participatein the governance of other fields? Are

we members, participant observers, orobjective critics of scientific communi-ties? Does this change if the researchemerges as a matter of public policyand public attention, such as stem cells,neuroscience, or synthetic biology?

The role of profession-based demo-cratic processes is also uncertain. Theexample of synthetic biologists showshow tentative—and easily derailed—the process remains. Still, democracy islargely a matter of habit. If the currentcommunity-based initiatives succeed,members will understand that part of science is taking both personal andcollective responsibility for its conse-quences. At that point, governance willstart to look much more natural.

There is nothing like a push to getthings started. The National Institutesof Health’s National Science AdvisoryBoard for Biosecurity has told biolo-gists that they need to put their housein order. Anyone who has been toWashington in the past six months can

testify to similar, if not blunter, warn-ings. If synthetic biologists do not takeaction (and perhaps even if they do),government will not shrink from im-posing its own regulations. Syntheticbiologists have always wanted to dothe right thing, but there is now a newurgency. After four years of discus-sion and debate, can they implementand enforce biosecurity initiatives assuccessfully and elegantly as they re- engineer life forms?

Opinions

DULY notedECONOMIES OF INFECTION | “The larger the pandemic, in terms of proportionof the population infected, the greater the economic impact. For infection rates up to1 percent of the world’s population, a decrease in global [gross domestic product]of 5 percent could be expected, with an additional loss of 1 percent per additionalpercentage increase in infection rate. Once a critical infection rate was reached, the

cumulative economic disruption would produce a shut-down of the global economy,similar to that seen in the United Kingdom’s agricultural economy following the 2001outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. . . .”—The World Health Report 2007: A Safer Fu-

ture: Global Public Health Security in the 21st Century , August 2007.

  WELCOME, TO THE MACHINES | “Silicon machines can now play chess bet-ter than any protein machines can. Big deal. This calm and reasonable reaction,however, is hard for most people to sustain. They don’t like the idea that theirbrains are protein machines.”—Daniel C. Dennett, “Higher Games,” Technology Re-

view , September/October 2007.

ENERGY SEPPUKU | “As soon as it is discovered that Japan has diverted [nu-clear materials and technologies] to weapons development, Japan will not only see

its supplies of nuclear fuel cut off but will also be required to return all the materialprovided theretofore. This will lead to a virtual suspension of all nuclear activitiesin Japan, causing serious economic damage to a country in which nuclear energyaccounts for a third of total power generation.”—Tetsuya Endo, former vice chair-

man of the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan, speculating about the international

reaction if Japan were to develop nuclear weapons, in a publication of the Association

of the Japanese Institutes of Strategic Studies.

 THE NUCLEAR SEE | “In the difficult crossroads in which humanity finds itself,the commitment . . . to support the use of peaceful and safe nuclear technology. . . isalways more present and urgent.” —Pope Benedict XVI congratulating the International

Atomic Energy Agency on its fiftieth anniversary on July 29, 2007.