A dear friend of mine Ali Nouri (also a AAAS congressional fellow) has published an interesting commentary in the current issue of Nature Biotech. Generally, we (the scientists) sometimes fail to grasp the security implications of science. Now, while the uninhibited progression of science is essential for our prosperity and avoiding regression back to another dark age, we should also try to find inexpensive and applivable ways to boost security.
Making an entire organism from scratch is not a dream anymore. This has been done in case of many viruses. The resurrection of the 1918 influenza virus caused a turmoil in our field. While we learned alot about the virus (e.g. how close it actually is to avian flu), many questioned whether this type of research should be prohibited. Personally, I don't think any type of basic research should be prohibited because any thing may simply revolutionize our lives, but I agree that this information should be protected against misuse and abuse.
In this commentary, the authors have simply requetsed the companies to screen their bulk requests and raise a red flag if the requested gene or genome belongs to a list of dangerous oragnsisms or toxins. Steps as simple as this are very cheap to implement. And I'm sure many of you are already coming up with solutions for potential bypass of this problem. But if we put enough obstacles in the way of misusing these technologies, the accumulative security would actually synergistically increase and may very well pass the threshold for many ill-willed individuals.
1 comment:
Sounds like an interesting idea, but how would screening work for small pieces of DNA? Is there a certain DNA size threshold, below which screening would no longer work??
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