J u l y /A ug ust 2 0 1 0 • V o l 25 • No 7 • HKD30
In This Issue
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A Tax Issue
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Synthia: Replicating Life
Captains of Industry By Rory Mitchell
On
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PAGE Sports Safety
20 May, 2010, a team of scientists
organism. Venter published the genomes of
The first major breakthrough towards this
from the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI)
two organisms that year, including that of a
goal came in 2008, when the JCVI team
announced that they had created the first
bacterium, Mycoplasma genitalium, which is
announced that they had successfully
self-replicating synthetic life-form, named
thought to have the smallest genome of all
recreated the genome of M. genitalium
“ S y n t h i a ” . T h i s re m a r k a b l e re s u l t , t h e
existent life forms. Since then, much of his
in the lab, using the basic building blocks
culmination of 15 years' work at a cost
research has been geared towards discovering
of DNA. The next step was to come up
of almost £30 million, has been hailed by
the smallest possible genome that can function
with a method of transferring the synthetic
some as a landmark step towards a full
as an “operating system” for a living organism,
genome to a new cell, thereby creating a
understanding of the mysteries of life,
in order to better understand the underlying
new organism that could successfully self-
and by others as a dangerous example
biology that gives rise to life itself.
replicate – one of the essential properties of a living organism.
of scientists “playing god”. The truth, as
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tends to be the case, is far less sensational
In the intervening years, Venter and his team
but no less exciting: Dr Venter and his
have developed a number of new scientific
Two years on, Venter and his team have
team have designed a process for creating
t e c h n i q u e s i n t h e i r q u e s t t o c re a t e a
finally achieved their goal. Synthia is a new,
new micro-organisms that could have
synthetic organism, beginning with a method
synthetic form of bacteria, based on the
a wide range of applications, impacting
for writing genetic code. This code, DNA,
genetic code of a fast-growing species
areas as diverse as energy security, food
is essentially made up of four chemicals,
named Mycoplasma mycoides. The team
provision, environmental protection and
referred to by the letters A, C, G and T.
built up a synthetic code modelled on
human health.
Scientists had already learned how to analyse
the M. mycoides genome, deleting or
the DNA of a living creature and store it as
changing a number of genes and adding
code on a computer; Venter's goal was to
several “watermark sequences” in order to
invert this process, designing a new genetic
distinguish the synthetic bacterium from
code on a computer and then transplanting
its natural counterpart. The new genome
this code into a cellular organism to create a
was assembled in a yeast cell, and then
new, synthetic form of life.
transplanted into the cell of another strain
PAGE Having a Ball
A long journey Dr Venter first came to public attention in 1995, when he became the first scientist to decode
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and sequence the entire genome of a living
(Continued on page 2)
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