Category: Uncategorized

J CRAIG VENTER digitizing life makes almost anything possible: “Digital life and actual life are getting closer and closer together. We can digitise a genome and transmit the information down the internet to a digital-biological converter, which can turn it back into DNA in a real cell.”" " http://lnkd.in/N2iWs2 View in LinkedIn

GEORGE CHURCH gets silly. "In 2012, George M. Church encoded one of his books about synthetic biology in DNA. The 5.3 Mb of data from the book is more than 1000 times greater than the previous largest amount of information to be stored in synthesized DNA."" " http://lnkd.in/TC5QS9. View in LinkedIn

SYNBIO: LIFE FROM INKJET PRINTERS. Try and explain this to your elderly relative! "Oligonucleotides harvested from a photolithographic or inkjet manufactured DNA chip combined with DNA mismatch error-correction allows inexpensive large-scale changes of codons in genetic systems to improve gene expression or incorporate novel amino-acids (see George M. Church's and Anthony Forster's synthetic cell projects.) This favors a synthesis-from-scratch approach."" " http://lnkd.in/TC5QS9 View in LinkedIn

SYNBIO FIELDS. "Studies in synthetic biology can be subdivided into broad classifications according to the approach they take to the problem at hand: (1). photocell design; (2). biomolecular engineering; (3). genome engineering; and (4). biomolecular-design." And of course, to create life from scratch. " " http://lnkd.in/TC5QS9 View in LinkedIn

GM CROPS. " Genetically modified crops have been used for commercial production since the 1990s and today, 29 countries are growing GM crops on a total of 160 million hectares according to ISAAA. And, that number is growing very rapidly."" " http://lnkd.in/cFaBdc View in LinkedIn

ETHANOL POLICY. "In the past six years, since U.S. ethanol mandate became law, 123 million new acres around the world have gone into production. Most of those acres were in China, India, Africa, and South America. This is one of the ripple effects of the new demand and consequent higher prices created by biofuels policies." 40% of corn goes into ethanol, 20% for animal feed, and 13% exported. The rest is for food (and drink). " "" " http://lnkd.in/cFaBdc View in LinkedIn

SYNBIO: great article by my friend Eric Hoffman, “Food Made from Scratch”, Monsanto has joined with Sapphire Energy in an algae venture... J. Craig Venter has formed a new company, Agradis, which will use synthetic biology to create higher-yielding castor and sweet sorghum for biofuels, among other things...researchers at the Department of Energy’s NREL will be able to improve the efficiency of photosynthesis, using amino acid building blocks to build plants from scratch."" " http://lnkd.in/cFaBdc View in LinkedIn

BIOLOGY IS TECHNOLOGY. "Julie Gould said that the new phrase which is catching on is “biology is technology”. In a period of ten weeks (a team) created a bacteria, Auxin...useful in solving desertification. They engineered E coli bacteria to contain sets of genes with growth hormone and also with malate, a root detector. The bacteria were able to swim towards roots, become absorbed by the roots, and then release hormones to stimulate growth."" " http://lnkd.in/cFaBdc View in LinkedIn

AG SYNBIO's potential. "the ability to raise crops using fewer pesticides; an offer of greater food security; improved nutrition; livestock which produce medications or biological substances such as spider-silk; an optimal source of biofuel; new ways to target infectious diseases and cancer, develop vaccines and cell therapies, enable regenerative medicine, or make cancer cells self-destruct. The potential seems limitless."" " http://lnkd.in/cFaBdc View in LinkedIn

GARAGE-BASED INNOVATORS, Obama salutes SMEs: "garage biology is good and necessary for the future physical and economic security of the United States.” This position acknowledges the historical analysis that because entrepreneurs and small organizations – i.e. “garages” – have been critical drivers of diverse technological innovation in the U.S. for several centuries, so are garages likely to be critical for future innovation in biotechnology."" " http://lnkd.in/cFaBdc View in LinkedIn