Honestly, besides PPE (personal protective equipment) I am pretty sure this varies widely. I don't do recombinant DNA at this time, mostly barcoding, phylogenetic and evolutionary research on bacteria and nematodes, so I don't have the need for such things but I can see why it is an issue. Regarding the rDNA being safe, I remember articles on plasmid population genetics from the 70s trying to predict the probability engineered plasmids could propagate widely in the ecological community. As you say, nothing happened so people feel safe.
My biggest concern, at least now, is people hurting themselves. While not impugning anyone's motives or knowledge I think actual knowledge and effective DIY Bio has still to catch up with enthusiasm in many quarters. Biohackers compare genetic engineering to computer programming but that's pretty strained in my opinion especially as programming is today. Maybe you can compare it to the programming in the 70s and 80s where you needed to know assembly and the workings of computer memory, CPU, bus, etc. to make it work. Getting a CRISPR-Cas9 kit and some synthesized DNA is not going to get much without much more detailed knowledge and hopefully people with that knowledge will take precautions.
I do think we could all see a chilling effect though if someone does something bad or dangerous. I have been in amateur science for a bit and remember over at the amateur chemistry site, Sciencemadness.org how everyone was aghast when the Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik referenced the site and other sources for chemical supplies in his manifesto on how to make explosives. If someone even tried to do something illegal or damaging we would feel the blowback, no matter how much ethics we try to push and this list is pretty ethical from what I have seen.
But none of us have enforcement power, we can just give recommendations and tips as far as I know. Worst comes to worst, we would need to understand if we would ever have to report someone for doing anything completely dangerous.
On Wednesday, May 22, 2019 at 4:36:57 PM UTC-4, Matt Endrizzi wrote:
I hope folks might comment on the security measures taken by the DIYbio community to ensure containment of recombinant DNA. My background is in molecular biology at Florida State, Harvard Med, and the Whitehead Institute (currently Broad). I have several concerns:
1) The biological community in general seems to have concluded that rDNA is not hazardous because nothing noticeably bad has happened in the last 40 years. Look at figure 2 in this paper:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5898234/
In short, it has been shown through viral sequence analysis that plasmid DNA and other bacterial DNA can evolve into a eukaryotic virus. So plasmids we make today can contribute to viruses in the future. Risk increases with time as well as trials.
40 years is not long enough to conclude rDNA is safe.
2) Bioethics conversations focus on CRISPR application in humans. Should we be considering how our synthetic nucleic acids might affect the ecosystem that supports us? We are making nucleotide sequences that nature would likely never make.
3) I have taught high schoolers now for 15 years. If you want to know how an experiment can fail, have high schoolers do it. Whether through malice or inattention, students often make mistakes making solutions, much less performing ligation reactions or bacterial transformations. They are also not good at cleaning up. What is the competency level in your DIY lab?
4) What assurances can the DIYbio community give that BSL1 safety levels are being met and that rDNA and everything it touches are being sterilized properly?
-- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups DIYbio group. To post to this group, send email to diybio@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to diybio+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at https://groups.google.com/d/forum/diybio?hl=en
Learn more at www.diybio.org
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "DIYbio" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to diybio+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to diybio@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/diybio.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/diybio/125910b0-7dd8-49cb-9a68-9d00c54f1252%40googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
0 comments:
Post a Comment