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19 October 2007
Web 2.0 Summit - J. Craig Venter
Posted by Paul Miller at October 19, 2007 05:08 PM
The last day of Web 2.0 kicks off with Tim O'Reilly in conversation with “the world's leading genetic engineer', J. Craig Venter. His new book is out today...
Tim - The future is here, it's just not evenly distributed; Craig has had his complete genome decoded, and is living in a future that the rest of us will reach.
Craig - ”I'm J. Craig Venter 1.0“.
Tim - might you check your genome like we check our stocks?
Craig - I think it's inevitable that this might happen.
Wants to reach 10,000 individuals with their whole genome sequenced.
At end of 2001, we assumed we all had the same genes, and that differences between people were determined at the edges. Now we know it's far more complex, hence the need to capture entire genomes.
Tim - what about privacy?
Craig - well my genome's on the internet, so it's not very private.
Tim - but what about use in law enforcement, insurance companies, etc? [Sounds like the book I read on the flight over!]
Tim - ”so you don't think people will google their date's genome before going out on a date?“
Craig - ”I think it would be a very good idea, especially if they planned to have kids“.
Hmm.
Recognition that we need to legislate to protect against prejudice. But does that really work?
Tim - moving from reading the genome to writing it...
Synthetic genomics - remake the analogue genetic code (dna) from digitised forms in the computer, and 'boot up life'. Two weeks to go from digitised dna to 'viral particles' in the lab.
Tim - how far can we synthesise a living bacteria?
Craig - weeks to months away. (!)
Tim - what's it going to mean, when we're synthesising really large genomes?
Craig - it'll change everything. ...trying to find a substitute for burning oil and coal... new fuel in testing that could be a green jet fuel... biological fuel cells, driven by bacteria, that take human waste water (very polite!) and either generate electricity or produce clean water.
”ethanol's great for drinking, it's not a good fuel“
Tim - synthetic biology - danger of designer organisms.
Craig - fortunately there aren't that many people on the planet with that intent. Naive, surely?
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