Just because the announcement last week of the creation of a viable bacterium, whose entire genome had been entirely synthesised from the basic chemical constituents of DNA, had been expected for some time (after all the new bacterium came from the laboratory of the master scientist/publicist Craig Venter) doesn’t mean that it is any less momentous. Several years ago Craig Venter famously set the race for the first initial sequencing of the human genome alight by announcing that his privately-funded enterprise would sequence the human genome in three years at the time when the multinational collaborative, public-funded human genome project was plodding along three years into a planned ten years programme. The effect of Venter’s challenge was sufficient to galvanise the public consortium into revitalising their programme so that in the end both groups achieved the objectives at the same time. Since then Venter has made no secret of the next major objective of his lab which has now been reached, namely the creation of a viable cell whose DNA has been entirely chemically synthesised. Of course many biologists rightly say that for years now the insertion into existing genomes of stretches of foreign DNA, whether extracted from other organisms or synthesised from the base chemicals, has been routine practice in the world of genetic engineering. In addition they point out that   while Venter’s DNA was chemically manufactured according to a base sequence specified by scientists, the new genome still had to be inserted into an existing cell (specifically Mycobacterium mycoides) from which existing native DNA had been removed, together with certain restriction enzymes which could otherwise have degraded the inserted synthetic nucleic acid. Nevertheless the demonstrated viability of Venter’s  mycobacterium is indeed momentous, if only because this is surely just the first of a long series of other organisms that will be created in the new discipline of synthetic biology. Automated systems for the synthesis of specified DNA sequences  are continuing to be developed at an amazing rate (over the last decade the estimated cost of synthesising one DNA base pair has fallen from approximately $100 to around one US cent), so extension of the new science of synthetic biology to non-prokaryotic systems is only a matter of time. The real question is what the new technology will be used for. At the moment rough proposals have been made regarding the future creation of synthetic genomes that will allow eukaryotic systems (algae look like being the first) to be able to carry out for, example, the photosynthetic absorption of CO2 from power stations, or other vaguely defined worthwhile causes such as the production of new drugs, vaccines or fuels.
The real challenge of the recent announcement is not so much the technology itself but rather the intellectual property questions around it. Craig Venter has already introduced patent claims on his technology which, if granted, could ultimately give his lab monopoly rights to the use of this genetic engineering. The outcry against this has just started.