A new method to synthesize long sequences of DNA lowers costs and increases speed of synthesis by orders of magnitude. (same article here)

HOUSTON, Dec. 22, 2004 – Devices the size of a pager now have greater capabilities than computers that once occupied an entire room. Similar advances are being made in the emerging field of synthetic biology at the University of Houston, now allowing researchers to inexpensively program the chemical synthesis of entire genes on a single microchip.

Xiaolian Gao, a professor in the department of biology and biochemistry at UH, works at the leading edge of this field. Her recent findings on how to mass produce multiple genes on a single chip are described in a paper titled "Accurate multiplex gene synthesis from programmable DNA microchips," appearing in the current issue of Nature, the weekly scientific journal for biological and physical sciences research.

"Synthetic genes are like a box of Lego building blocks," Gao said. "Their organization is very complex, even in simple organisms. By making programmed synthesis of genes economical, we can provide more efficient tools to aid the efforts of researchers to understand the molecular mechanisms that regulate biological systems. There are many potential biochemical and biomedical applications."

Most immediately, examples include understanding the regulation of gene function. Down the road, these efforts will improve health care, medicine and the environment at a fundamental level.

Long time FuturePundit readers have heard me argue that the rate of advance of biotechnology is increasingly resembling the rate of advance of electronics technologies such as silicon chip fabrication, hard drive fabrication, and fiber optic fabrication where the technologies produce gains in capacities and speeds that give them doubling times in months to years. Well for just this one biotechnological capability - the rate at which DNA can be synthesized - the advance has been by two whole orders of magnitude in a single step forward. This rate of increase is at least briefly many times faster than the rates of increase of the electronics technologies.

Using current methods, programmed synthesis of a typical gene costs thousands of dollars. Thus, the prospect of creating the most primitive of living organisms, which requires synthesis of several thousand genes, would be prohibitive, costing millions of dollars and years of time. The system developed by Gao and her partners employs digital technology similar to that used in making computer chips and thereby reduces cost and time factors drastically. Gao's group estimates that the new technology will be about one hundred times more cost- and time-efficient than current technologies.

With this discovery, Gao and her colleagues have developed a technology with the potential to make complete functioning organisms that can produce energy, neutralize toxins and make drugs and artificial genes that could eventually be used in gene therapy procedures. Gene therapy is a promising approach to the treatment of genetic disorders, debilitating neurological diseases such as Parkinson's and endocrine disorders such as diabetes. This technology may therefore yield profound benefits for human health and quality of life.

Is this the sign of more things to come? Will the rate of increase of DNA sequencing technologies take a step forward as great as the step just made by DNA synthesis technologies? A couple of order of magnitude decrease in DNA sequencing costs would put personal DNA sequencing within reach for wealthy people anyway and would produce a great acceleration in the rate at which the effects of various genetic sequence variations are identified.

This advance in DNA sequencing sounds great, right? But some of you must be thinking that this technology could be used for nefarious purposes to construct dangerous pathogens such as smallpox or a massive killer influenza strain. Well, this fear is not limited only to the circles of educated laymen. Nicholas Wade of the New York Times reports that some scientists are concerned that fast DNA synthesis technology will make construction of dangerous pathogens too easy. (same article here and here

"This has the potential for a revolutionary impact in the ease of synthesis of large DNA molecules," said Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University with an interest in bioterrorism.

"This will permit efficient and rapid synthesis of any select agent virus genome in very short order," he added, referring to the list of dangerous pathogens and toxins that must be registered with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

George Church of Harvard, one of the collaborators in the development of these machines, is so concerned about the potential danger of this technology that he would like to see the machines sold only to labs that register with the government.

Most of the really dangerous pathogens have had their DNA sequenced and published in the public domain. For example, the genomes of at least a dozen pox viruses including smallpox have been sequenced and published. Feel safe with the knowledge that some governments are contracting production of large amounts of smallpox vaccine? Well, greater understanding many viruses (and very likely smallpox among them) will eventually provide enough understanding to allow the construction virus variations that have surface antigen structures different enough that existing viruses will not provide much if any protection.

Now of course the problem with highly transmissible pathogens such as smallpox as bioterrorism agents is that they are likely to spread across the world and into societies that terrorists may be seeking to protect against perceived threats coming from other societies in a Clash of Civilizations. Most terrorist groups are therefore likely to rule out the use highly transmissible pathogens as terrorism weapons. A guy like Osama Bin Laden must understand that if he releases a large amount of smallpox in America then good Muslims will die when the disease inevitably spreads across international borders.

Still, it is not at all impossible that some religious fringe group could decide God has called on it to kill people all over the world because the human race has rejected some special message that all humans should recognize as obvious. Still other terrorists could decide that God has told them that only the unfaithful will be felled by some pathogen.

Technologies and capabilities are needed to enable better responses to a deadly outbreak of a lethal natural or human-made disease pandemic. We need biotechnologies that accelerate by orders of magnitude the rate at which new vaccines and drug treatments can be developed. Also, we need to develop more capabilities to "harden" society against a major pandemic in the same way that militaries harden bunkers against bombs. We need ways to reduce inter-human contacts by orders of magnitude while still allowing the bulk of normal operations of society to be performed. We need rapidly manufacturable face masks, building air filters, and other technologies that could reduce the ease of transmission of airborne pathogens.