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'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

news.bbc.co.uk

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Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#11

Post by raimondious »

amichail wrote: post #8
raimondious wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say they "just copied the genome" like that's easy to do. This is a landmark because they synthesized the entire genome using nothing but the sequence stored in a computer, much more difficult than replicating a pre-existing piece of DNA.

Even so, calling it artificial life is highly misleading.

I think it's pretty accurate. There was only information to begin with, and now there is life. It happens that information was gained from a pre-existing cell, but this new cell has nothing to do with the cell it's derived from, it's made completely by the work of humans. That has never happened before.

Edit: However, I know what you mean about it not being 100% artificial, as in completely designed by humans: Maybe "synthetic life" is better?

Further edit: More than using a pre-existing genome, what makes it not completely artificial is that they had to put their DNA into another cell, basically cloning using synthesized DNA rather than natural DNA.

Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#12

Post by FlorinAndrei »

amichail wrote: post #8
raimondious wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say they "just copied the genome" like that's easy to do. This is a landmark because they synthesized the entire genome using nothing but the sequence stored in a computer, much more difficult than replicating a pre-existing piece of DNA.

Even so, calling it artificial life is highly misleading.

I agree. They wrote a new OS and uploaded it into existing hardware.

Still a great feat, but not quite 100% "artificial life" yet.

Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#13

Post by crystalis »

amichail wrote: post #8
raimondious wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say they "just copied the genome" like that's easy to do. This is a landmark because they synthesized the entire genome using nothing but the sequence stored in a computer, much more difficult than replicating a pre-existing piece of DNA.

Even so, calling it artificial life is highly misleading.

Consider natural and artificial vanilla flavoring; it's more technical usage than misleading.

(Natural vanilla is harvested from beans, resulting in vanillin, etc. Artificial vanilla is synthesized from e.g., bacteria, and in specific cases molecular synthesis.)

Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#14

Post by kls »

amichail wrote: post #8
raimondious wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say they "just copied the genome" like that's easy to do. This is a landmark because they synthesized the entire genome using nothing but the sequence stored in a computer, much more difficult than replicating a pre-existing piece of DNA.

Even so, calling it artificial life is highly misleading.

I don't know about that, to date genetic engineering consisted of taking DNA from one organism, isolating a desired trait from another organism and using a gun or splicer to "inject" that code into preexisting DNA. These guys scaffold the DNA from the basic building blocks. There is a huge difference. Personally to me they are both artificial life as neither occurred via random selection, it is just one used a current organisms DNA as the building block, while the other used the bare elements to put together all of the DNA. The value of the second approach is that you don't get all of the junk that comes with harvested DNA you only get what you specify.

Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#15

Post by raimondious »

glymor wrote: post #4

Better write up: http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2010/05/first-functional...

This one is pretty informative too http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/21/science/21cell.html

Another one from Venter's website: http://www.jcvi.org/cms/research/projects/first-self-replica... (on HN http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1364544)

Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#16

Post by bh42 »

orblivion wrote: post #5

Call me a luddite, genetic engineering gives me the willies.

Luddite.

In all seriousness, the dangers brought up in the article can only come from a person lacking significant knowledge of bacteria.

Unimaginable numbers of bacteria permeate every part of the world, including miles within the earth, deep sea volcanic vents, radioactive waste, the rain drops falling on our heads, and us, up our noses, in our skin pores, our guts, etc.

Those simple bacteria evolve at staggering rates, and swap genes like DJ Danger Mouse mixing tracks.

Any new synthetic, or extraterrestrial, or magical, life form would have to compete. And unless you believe in magic it is unlikely to out-compete in a pre-existing niche.

The grey goo danger often thrown at nano-tech, is possible only if we violate one or more of the basic laws of thermodynamics.

And when it comes to antibiotic resistant bacteria, well we are already doing a great job of breeding those within ourselves.

But if you grew a barrel full of MRSA and then poured it down your toilet, the SA wold quickly lose its metabolically expensive MR. Because there is no Methicillin in the sewer, the resistance to Methicillin is a disadvantage. And the only way the Staphylococcus aureus could survive is if it dumped this feature.

But luckily you're probably taking antibiotics so you are a niche where MRSA can out-compete and thrive.

Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#17

Post by marciovm123 »

amichail wrote: post #8
raimondious wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say they "just copied the genome" like that's easy to do. This is a landmark because they synthesized the entire genome using nothing but the sequence stored in a computer, much more difficult than replicating a pre-existing piece of DNA.

Even so, calling it artificial life is highly misleading.

It's fairly likely that every life-form that currently exists in this planet has a common ancestor that self-assembled billions of years ago. Your genetic code is the result of a huge amount of cycles of copies (and mutations) of that common ancestor's DNA.

The life form that Venter created is separate from that lineage - its genetic code was synthesized from basic building blocks, not copied from an ancestor (at least in a biochemical sense; the information content was indeed copied, but that's another hurdle).

Whether or not this makes it "artificial life" depends on your definition of "life", and there's a surprising amount of controversy there.

Re: 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

#19

Post by WilliamLP »

bh42 wrote: post #16
orblivion wrote: post #5

Call me a luddite, genetic engineering gives me the willies.

Luddite. In all seriousness, the dangers brought up in the article can only come from a person lacking significant knowledge of bacteria. Unimaginable numbers of bacteria permeate every part of the world, including miles within the earth, deep sea volcanic vents, radioactive waste, the rain drops falling on our heads, and us, up our noses, in our skin pores, our guts, etc. Those simple bacteria evolve at staggering r…

> And unless you believe in magic it is unlikely to out-compete in a pre-existing niche.

Cars are faster than land animals. Planes are faster than birds. Not being constrained by needing to have come from slow gradual iteration might open some possibilities, some terrifying. Biology doesn't produce the wheel.

To consider this as a possibility is not to believe in magic.

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