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… you’ll learn about the implications of synthetic biology in Part 1 a special two-part episode.
Andrew Hessel and Amy Webb recently authored, “The Genesis Machine: Our Quest to Rewrite Life in the Age of Synthetic Biology.” This Part 1 episode gets into the scientific perspective with Andrew. Part 2 on episode #914 explores the futurist perspective with Amy.
Ask yourself, if you could edit your genes—to fix infertility, diabetes or even depression—would you do it? That’s the premise, and the promise, of synthetic biology. And a reality you’ll have to wrestle with. To make these decisions intelligently requires a deeper—and urgent—understanding of what’s happening in science.
Right now, scientists are rewriting the rules of our reality. They can use computers to gain access to the cells of any living organism and write new, potentially better, biological code.
“All life has basically the same machine and the cell doesn’t matter whether it’s a single-celled organ, like a bacterium or you and me, the core machinery is the same,” says Andrew. “The programming language of DNA is the same, and all of the diversity we get in the natural world around us is really just different software.”
Andrew—a microbiologist and geneticist—works on the leading edge of genomics and bioinformatics. He’s been immersed in the world of synthetic biology for years and joins the show to explain new advancements.
As a scientist, communicator, and investor, he explores the future of biology and biotechnology. He co-founded the Center of Excellence for Engineering Biology and the Genome Project-write. The Genome Project-write is an international scientific effort that designs and builds large genomes, including the human genome.
“Synthetic biology is where it gets interesting because now you actually start to want to program that code,” he says. “You actually want to start writing programs, and that sounds a little weird, but once you’ve sequenced an organism and got that information into the computer, it’s like using a word processor.”
As we embrace that life no longer will be a game of chance, it will be the result of design, selection and choice, morechoices have to be made. Decisions like who gets to program life, create new life forms, and even bring former life back from extinction?
“The Genesis Machine’ is a book about science, but it’s not written for scientists, Andrew says. “It’s about some amazing people and stories and we’ve got some fun scenarios that help you think about where some of this stuff is going. But really, this is a technology that we’re all building day by day.”
Enjoy the show!
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Book: “The Genesis Machine: Our Quest to Rewrite Life in the Age of Synthetic Biology”
About Andrew Hessel: humanegenomics.com/team/
Twitter: twitter.com/andrewhessel
Center of Excellence for Engineering Biology: engineeringbiologycenter.org/leadership/
Previously on Bulletproof Radio:
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