What’s the Future of Synthetic Biology?
June 21, 2011
Last July, scientists created the first “synthetic cell,” an organism that’s controlled by a chemically synthesized genome edited on a computer and stitched together in the lab. One year later, biologists at the Fifth Annual Synthetic Biology conference at Stanford University are still struggling to take the next step in the field. Holding them back are the vagaries of biology itself, and the expense and time needed to get from idea to engineered organism. (Technology Review)
