DonnĂŠes complĂŠmentaires
Timecode
1.1
1.2
1.3
L’intelligence artificielle
L’impression 3D
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L.A. surgeons implant device to help deaf 3-year-old hear by Amina Khan
« La stratégie secrète de Google apparaît » Interview de Laurent Alexandre
The 3D revolution will blow you away by Sally Kohn
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2.2
2.3
La NanoTech médicale
L’alimentation
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23andMe, the Google of genetics by Rubenstein Communications
Nanotechnology is revolutionizing medicineInterview by Brandon Engel
The man who thinks he never has to eat again by Perri Klass
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3.2
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La reproduction
L’utérus artificiel
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Nous vivrons mille ans de Catherine Schwaab
Scientists generate sperm from skin cells of infertile men by Justine Alford
The artificial womb Is born by Perri Klass
L’interface neuronale direct
L’ADN
La modification génétique
Log-in
Plus la vitesse et la masse d’un objet est croissante, plus le produit le produit de leur valeur augmente. Ce phénomène donne la sensation que l’objet est inarrêtable. C’est ce qu’en physique mécanique on appelle le Momentum. Mais ce concept peut aussi s’appliquer métaphoriquement à la technologie.
Plus on avance dans le temps, plus la vitesse et la quantité des nouvelles découvertes sont importantes et augmentent de manière exponentielle. Ces technologies, que l’on connaît déjà un peu, vont totalement métamorphoser nos sociétés dans les cinquante prochaines années à venir. Et cela notamment grâce à la convergence N.B.I.C. qui englobe les domaines de la Nano technologie, la Bio technologie, l’Informatique et, le plus important, la Cognitique : la compréhension du cerveau humain. Momentum est un projet qui montre au grand public ces nouvelles technologies qui feront partie de notre futur. Il est fondamental d’être au courant de ces avancées pour ne pas se faire dépasser par des technologies qui aujourd’hui impensables, seront très bientôt acceptées, puis banalisées. Dans ce livret additionnel vous trouverez une analyse de chaque scène de la vidéo Momentum ainsi que des articles qui reflètent la te chnologie évoquée dans les scènes.
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Le premier épisode de la vidéo montre une interface neuronale directe. La personne est reliée à internet par son cerveau grâce à des implants. C’est l’évolution directe des implants cochléaire et rétiniens qui existent déjà et qui aident à restituer respectivement l’ouïe et la vue aux patients.
L.A. surgeons implant device to help deaf 3-year-old hear Los Angeles Times May 7 2014 by Amina Khan
After a roughly six-hour operation, surgeons at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles have successfully inserted a device in the brain stem of a deaf 3-year-old boy in the hope that it will help him to hear. The operation, the first in a clinical trial supported by the National Institutes of Health, could help set a precedent for the safety and efficacy of a surgery that has been performed for years abroad but is considered risky by some in the U.S. It is being led by researchers from the House Clinic in Los Angeles and USC. « This is a great relief » said Auguste Majkowski’s mother, Sophie Gareau, shortly after the surgery on Tuesday. Gareau, who traveled from Montreal for the procedure, wept after hearing from one of the doctors that her son’s operation went well. Auguste, a lively toddler with a love of firetrucks and boundless energy, was born deaf. After he was diagnosed when he was a year and a half old, doctors surgically introduced a cochlear implant to help him hear. The implant uses an electrode array inserted into the inner ear, or cochlea, to directly stimulate the auditory nerve whenever the device picks up sound. But Auguste’s cochlear implant didn’t work. The auditory nerve leading from the cochlea to the brain stem appeared to be missing – and without a natural “wire” to transmit sound to the brain stem, the device was of no use. “I had to deal with that,” Gareau said. “It’s not easy to think something’s going to work, and then it’s not working.” But the fact that Auguste had already had a cochlear implant actually made him a good candidate for the study, said House Clinic neurotologist Eric Wilkinson, one of the lead researchers for the clinical trial and one of the surgeons who performed Auguste’s operation. It showed that as far as hearing devices went, the ABI truly was the family’s only option. “You don’t want to put a brainstem implant in if you don’t have to,” he said. “It’s more involved, there’s more risk, it’s a bigger surgery.” The auditory brain stem
Épisode 1.1 Intérface neuronale directe
implant, or ABI, offers a way to bypass that missing wire. Surgeons place a device on the cochlear nucleus, the part of the brain stem that receives sound, and use a network of electrodes to stimulate this spot directly. Surgeons have used this device for years on people who have lost hearing because of an accident or a rare type of tumor that affects the auditory nerve, and who would not benefit from a cochlear implant. But it can’t help adults who have been deaf all their lives, because their brains have developed without exposure to sound. In order to work in people who are born deaf, the device has to be implanted when they are very young. To date, most ABI surgeries on young children have been done in Europe. A few operations have been performed on young children in the United States, but this would be the first NIH-funded, FDA-approved clinical trial to test it in kids who were born deaf, said USC audiologist Laurie Eisenberg. Eisenberg is one of the lead investigators on the study, which seeks to implant the device in 10 young children. If the study shows it’s safe and effective, it could help clear the way for the implant surgery on young children to become a more accepted procedure in the U.S. This surgery could be « a great alternative for families, just as long as they know the potential risks and potential benefits,” said Dr. Walter Kutz, a neurotologist at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center who was not involved in the research. “It could really change their lives for the better. » The team of surgeons shook hands with Auguste’s parents Tuesday afternoon after completing the operation and successfully testing the ABI device to see whether the brain responded. Gareau and her husband, Christophe Majkowski, hugged tightly in a waiting room when they heard the news. Auguste’s new ABI is scheduled to be turned on in mid-June.
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Épisode 1.2 L’intelligence artificielle
« La stratégie secrète de Google apparaît » Laurent Alexandre est une personnalité atypique dont l’expertise est écoutée. Chirurgien urologue de formation, diplômé de l’ENA, HEC et Sciences-Po, cofondateur de Doctissimo.fr, il préside désormais la société de séquençage de génome DNA Vision. Ce « cerveau » s’intéresse « aux bouleversements qu’entraîneront pour l’humanité les progrès de la science, de la technomédecine et des biotechnologies ». Il y a consacré un essai remarqué intitulé La Mort de la mort dans lequel il affirme que « l’homme qui vivra 1.000 ans est déjà né ». Le Journal du Dimanche 8 Février 2014
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Interview de Laurent Alexandre par Juliette Demey
Google est le premier embryon d’intelligence artificielle au monde, selon vous. Pourquoi ? L’objectif des dirigeants de Google est de transformer leur moteur de recherche en intelligence artificielle. Progressivement ils s’en rapprochent. En fait, personne ne l’a vu venir, ni les utilisateurs quotidiens du moteur de recherche, ni ses concurrents. Il a fallu du temps pour que la stratégie des dirigeants de Google soit comprise. Je suis bluffé par la vitesse à laquelle cette société contrôle les industries clés du XXIe siècle.
intelligents… Pendant ce temps, sa Google Car, un mélange incroyable de robotique et d'intelligence artificielle, roule seule sur des milliers de kilomètres sur les routes de Californie sans accident. Si en l'an 2000 vous évoquiez l'idée d'une voiture robot autonome, tout le monde riait ! En 2025, elle sera démocratisée. Enfin, depuis quelques années, Google débauche les plus grands noms de l'intelligence artificielle. Comme Ray Kurzweil, le "pape" du transhumanisme, qui vient d'être nommé ingénieur en chef du moteur de recherche.
Expliquez-vous… Regardez la vague de rachats de start-up et de sociétés auxquels Google procède ! En deux ans, cette entreprise a réussi à préempter trois marchés clés. Celui de la lutte contre la mort : elle a créé Calico, une filiale qui a cet objectif fou d'augmenter l'espérance de vie de vingt ans d'ici à 2035. Elle a investi dans le séquençage ADN avec sa filiale 23andMe, mais aussi dans un projet de lentilles intelligentes pour les diabétiques, qui mesurent en temps réel votre glycémie. Parallèlement et en moins d'un an, Google a racheté les huit principales sociétés de robotique. Dont Boston Dynamics, qui crée le chien robot "BigDog" pour l'armée américaine, ou Nest, leader mondial de la domotique et des objets
Quel est le lien entre l’idéologie « transhumaniste » et Google ? Cette idéologie est née dans les années 1950. Elle considère légitime d’utiliser tous les moyens technologiques et scientifiques pour augmenter les capacités de l’homme – son corps, son cerveau, son ADN – et pour faire reculer la mort. À l’époque, c’était de la science-fiction ; aujourd’hui cela devient concret. Google soutient cette idéologie et maîtrise toutes les technologies qui la soustendent : la robotique, l’informatique, les moteurs de recherche et l’intelligence artificielle, les nanobiotechnologies, le séquençage ADN dont le coût a été divisé par 3 millions en dix ans… Quel est le but de cette croissance ten-
l’intelligence artificielle se retrouve dans une multitude d’ouvrages et films de science fiction. Mais c’est une vraie réalité qui aujourd’hui est à l’état embryonnaire.Reste à savoir sous quelle forme nous allons la percevoir et qui la controllera.
taculaire ? Une société qui maîtrise l’intelligence artificielle – et Google est la plus avancée sur ce terrain –peut potentiellement entrer dans n’importe quel domaine. Elle le fait d’ailleurs : elle est même présente dans les VTC qui concurrencent les taxis avec Uber, une filiale de Google Ventures ! En réalité, Google est beaucoup plus qu’une société informatique. Les principaux acteurs de la robotique viennent de le comprendre ; mais trop tard, Google a déjà racheté les meilleurs d’entre eux à bon prix. Cette stratégie est bluffante… Google a été la première à comprendre la puissance de la révolution des technologies NBIC, cette convergence de quatre vagues (nanotechnologies, bio-ingénierie, informatique et cognitique) qui va construire le XXIe siècle et donner une puissance extraordinaire à la lutte contre la mort. Car ces technologies NBIC constituent en réalité une seule et immense industrie. Le tableau est effrayant… N’est-ce pas trop tard ? Il n’est jamais trop tard. Mais la croissance très rapide des technologies NBIC rend possible ce qui relevait jadis de la science-fiction. La bataille entre le microprocesseur et le neurone a commencé, et l’intelligence artificielle arrive à grands pas. Selon la loi
de Moore, la puissance informatique double très rapidement. Le nombre d’opérations réalisées par les plus gros ordinateurs est multiplié par 1.000 tous les dix ans et donc par 1.000.000 en vingt ans. En 1950, un ordinateur effectuait 1.000 opérations par seconde. Aujourd’hui, on atteint 33 millions de milliards d’opérations par seconde. Ce sera 1.000 milliards de milliards en 2029 ! Autour de 2040 émergeront des machines dotées de la capacité du cerveau humain. Et d’ici à la fin du siècle, elles nous dépasseront en intelligence, ce qui poussera l’homme à vouloir « s’augmenter » par tous les moyens. Imaginez si de tels robots, plus forts que nous, ayant accès à l’intelligence artificielle et à l’impression 3D, connectés et contrôlant Internet, existaient… Leur pouvoir de manipulation serait quasi illimité. Quand « BigDog » aura un fusil d’assaut M16 dans les mains, il vaudra mieux ne pas se promener en forêt !
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The 3D revolution will blow you away
CNN.com April 30 2014
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by Sally Kohn
A company in China reportedly used giant 3-D printers to make 10 houses in one day. This leads to two obvious questions. First, how big were those printers ? The answer is: 10 meters wide by 6.6 meters high. A mixture of cement and construction waste were sprayed to build the walls layer by layer. And second, if 3-D printers could be used to create a neighborhood of full-sized, detached single family homes in less time and money than it would conventionally take, could 3-D printers help end homelessness ? I’m not Pollyanna-ish when it comes to ending poverty. Many of the world’s problems stem from decades of government policies that fostered inequality and neglect, dynamics that cannot be easily fixed by one solution. At the same time, I’m completely obsessed with 3-D printers, probably because I don’t fully understand them, so they seem like magic sent to us from the future by Captain Picard. If these printers can make even a dent in some of the world’s most pressing challenges, they would be even cooler in my book. So, what major social and economic problems might we potentially print our way out of ? Here are some possibilities :
L’impression 3D est vue aujourd’hui comme une révolution qui va changer une multitude d’industries. Ici on voit comment pourrait être appliquée cette technologie à travers un simple achat sur internet d’un T-shirt qui est ensuite dirèctement imprimé. Ceci pourrait ouvrir une toute autre conception de commenton perçoit le monde matèriel.
Hunger At South by Southwest this year, I got to eat candy that came out of a printer, courtesy of the folks at Deloitte. Last fall, writer A.J. Jacobs documented in The New York Times an entire meal he and his wife ate that was produced by 3-D printers, including pizza, pasta and dessert. While Jacobs needed the help of several companies and their Ph.D. staff to produce his meal, on Kickstarter, one startup tried to get funding for the « Foodini: » a 3-D food printer for home chefs. For now, the technology is too expensive, and like many trends the exploration is happening more in high-end settings (3-D printed caviar, anyone ?). But as the costs come down and the technology improves, could there be a 3-D printer making nutritious food in every village around the globe ? Perhaps. Homelessness It’s quite a feat for the Chinese company to build 10 homes in one day, but they’re not the only innovators. Earlier this year, Professor Behrokh Khoshnevis at the University of Southern California built a giant 3-D printer that can produce a basic house in one day. And in Amsterdam, construction has begun on what appears to be the first multistory – and aesthetically pleasing – 3-D printed house. Of course, homelessness is far more complex than simply a lack of housing. But the ability to create « affordable housing » even more affordably would not only help homeless people but also low-income individuals.
methods. Rather than having to throw out entire products when one piece needs replacing (« planned obsolescence »), 3-D printing will make it easier to replace parts. Even complex products can be produced and assembled locally rather than shipped from across the continent, which would reduce the carbon footprint. (The raw materials will need to be shipped, but they take up less room.)
Épisode 1.3 L’impression 3D
Disease I understand stem cells even less than I understand 3-D printing, so I’m not going to say much here except to note that scientists are experimenting with what seems to be impossible but apparently isn’t: printing human organs. CNN.com reported on how bioprinters use an « ink » of stem cells to print 3-D shapes that can be placed into the human body, where hopefully the cells will be accepted by the existing tissues. Bioprinting has a lot of potential. In 2013, a little girl born without a windpipe got one thanks to a 3-D printer that rendered one out of the girl’s own stem cells. A foundation has created a $1 million prize to be awarded to whomever comes up with the first 3-D printed functioning liver, which would be a big deal to the 17,000 Americans waiting for liver transplants – and a huge sign of hope to millions of people worldwide with all kinds of organ needs because of diseases and conditions.
Money Printing money is as illegal in three dimensions as it is in two. And while 3-D printing may never eliminate the need for money, it may change the demand for it. Think about how the Internet reduced the cost of information or how Spotify has reduced the cost of music. Or how cell phones are prevalent all over the world. Imagine years into the future when 3-D printers are just as affordable and available as cell phones. Communities could meet their basic needs – not just for food but everyday items – with far less money. Imagine a 3-D printer making plates and cups and toothbrushes and hammers and nails and much more for entire communities, to be shared or bartered for rather than purchased with cash. And for goods that are bought and sold, 3-D printing could maybe reduce costs without affecting production wages (I’m looking at you, WalMart).
Pollution There are many causes of climate change, one of which is pollution from industrial production. 3-D printing offers many promising alternatives to more traditionally wasteful and dirty manufacturing
The possibilities are so exciting that the World Bank has considered the implications of 3-D printing for reducing poverty and sharing prosperity. Let’s hope 3-D printing will truly be as revolutionary as we hope.
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« N ous rentrons dans une phase de fusion des technologies,
avec le vivant, avec la mĂŠdecine,
et qui va avoir des conséquences vertigineuses »
d’un point de vue technique, médical, mais aussi politique et philosophique.
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23andMe, the Google of genetics Today 23andMe, a leading personal genetics company, announced that it has built one of the world’s largest databases of individual genetic information. In the three and a half years since the launch of the company’s Personal Genome Service(R), its database has grown to include the DNA data of more than 100,000 people. Reuters May 15 2011 Rubenstein Communications
Épisode 2.1 L’ADN
While 23andMe customers have explored their DNA for insights into theirhealth and ancestry, more than three-fourths of them are also participating in research by allowing 23andMe’s scientists to incorporate their genetic data, as well as their responses to online questionnaires, into 23andMe’s IRB-approved studies. Nearly 60,000 of 23andMe’s users have taken online surveys, and those who take surveys fill out at least 10 surveys on average. 23andMe’s novel, web-based research approach allows for the rapid recruitment of participants to many genome-wide association studies at once, reducing the time and money needed to make new discoveries. « We started 23andMe to empower consumers with their own genetic information, » said 23andMe Co-Founder and President Anne Wojcicki. « Given the chance, we believed people would want to use their own data to contribute to research. And they do. While we are thrilled that more than 100,000 people have turned to 23andMe to gain access to their genetic information, we are equally delighted that over 76 percent of those individuals have agreed to participate with us in research. » Through the constant flow of survey responses and the continued growth of its database, 23andMe’s team of 20 scientists runs more than 1,000 genome-wide association studies for hundreds of condi-
L’ADN est un domaine clé de la convergence NBIC. Pour l’instant le séquençage de l’ADN se démocratise de plus en plus et permet de dépister précocément des maladies graves. Par la suite la génomique prendra toute son empleur, aussi grâce aux nano technologies, et permettrades modifications des gènes qui composent toutes nos caractéristiques.
tions on a regular basis. In less than three years, 23andMe has discovered new genetic associations for common traits, found novel genetic links for childhood and adult infections, replicated more than 150 previously identified genetic associations for dozens of common diseases and medical conditions, and discovered several new genetic variants associated with Parkinson’s disease. With more than 5,000 participants, 23andMe’s Parkinson’s Research Community represents one of the largest Parkinson’s studies in the world. Its Sarcoma Research Community of more than 500 participants is one of the world’s largest groups of individuals with this rare disease. The 23andMe research model is also being applied in other areas including a recently-launched NIH-funded study into how genetics affects individual response to common medications. « 23andMe has created an entirely new model for conducting research which we believe could significantly impact the speed of scientific discoveries going forward, » added Ms. Wojcicki. « In a short time, our customers have already helped us gain new genetic insights. Thank you to all our customers for enabling leading researchers around the world to accelerate their own studies. We look forward to an exciting future of important and meaningful research discoveries. » 23andMe additionally noted that 45 is the average age of its users, 57% of its users are male, 47% are sharing their data with other users and 12% have multiple ancestries -- representing heritage from over 177 countries from Azerbaijan to Zambia. The 23andMe community forums currently have over 100,000 posts and more than 60,000 pairs of relatives have been discovered among users using 23andMe’s unique Relative Finder feature.
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Nanotechnology is revolutionizing medicine Technology, and nanotechnology especially, is rapidly changing the medical field. The combination of nanotechnology with modern wireless technology is not only allowing medical professionals to attack maladies with a greater level of precision than ever before — it could completely change day-to-day operations in hospitals. NanoTech Now June 3 2014 by Brandon Engel
Some of the most astounding achievements of the past 15 years have been made in the laboratories of colleges and universities. For over a decade now, New York University chemists have been developing nanoscale mechanisms from DNA particles, which are effectively nanoscale robots which literally walk on two microscopic legs. The goal is to use nanobots to repair molecular damages to the human body. Digital technology comes into play here, also. The nanobots are equipped with tiny cameras and can be ingested by the patient in a small, pill-like capsule. They save hospitals time and money, because they can carry out intricate tasks, safely and swiftly. In many cases, they can fix problems which would otherwise require invasive surgeries. Once the bot is inside the patient, it should, ideally speaking, be able to do everything from taking biopsies to repairing cells. In some instances though, the objective isn’t to repair cells, but to destroy them, and nano-
bots are also useful towards that end. Harvard Medical School has been developing nanobots which are more or less shaped like barrels, and are capable of transporting molecules throughout the body which instigate « cell suicide » in both lymphoma and leukemia cells. But beyond treating medical conditions, nanotechnology may also prove to have useful diagnostic applications. Researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have developed their own unique method of monitoring levels of nitric oxide in a patient’s blood that uses a specially designed gel containing carbon nanotubes. This is particularly useful for medical practitioners, as the presence of nitric oxide in the blood speaks to the severity of an inflammation. In test mice, the gel worked for up to year. In addition to everything that’s been achieved by academic research institutions, there are a number of companies in the private sector who are also developing medical applications for nanotechnology.
La Nano technologie est un champ prodigieux et central de la convergence NBIC. C’est grâce à cette technologie qu’on va pouvoir intervenir au niveau molléculaire. Cette avancée va complètement changer notre façon de voir la médecine. De la prévention continue du corps humain jusqu’à la modification de l’ADN, la Nano technologie a encore beaucoup de choses à nous montrer.
The Arrowhead Research Company, for instance, is using nanotechnology to engineer RNAi therapeutic substances which effectively quell the production of harmful genes. In clinical trials, it’s been used to treat everything from macular degeneration to hepatitis. It’s also being used to halt the development of cancerous tumors. Another company to look out for is the Texas based Medical Nanotechnologies, who have been developing their own unique method of using nanoparticles which target cancerous cells with the aid of near-infrared light (NIR). NIR heats the nanoparticles, which then kill tumors via irradiation. Healthcare and technology are becoming inextricably linked. Knowledge of both nanotech devices, and the complex digital systems used to control them, may soon be a prerequisite for anyone wishing to enter into the medical field. In the near future, medical practitioners might need to be more information technology (IT) savvy . Some experts have even predicted that the healthcare system will eventually , with new systems built entirely around digital technology. Health IT is now a thriving industry, with major growth forecast by Research and
Market’s North American Healthcare IT Market Report 2013-2017. It is estimated that, if current trends persist, health IT will be a $31.3 billion dollar industry by 2017. That’s an annual growth rate of 7.4%. To keep pace with demand, more and more resources are becoming available to train and recruit health IT specialists. Tim Cannon, a Vice President at HealthITjobs.com also believes that the health IT industry will continue to grow in the near future. « Recent nanotechnology advances have created new job opportunities in the health IT industry that blend science, engineering and technology skills, » Cannon said. « Some studies have shown as many as 6 million new jobs will be created in nanotechnology by 2020 and a significant amount of those will be in healthcare. »
Épisode 2.2 La NanoTech médicale
Just as nanotech is allowing for a much higher degree of exactitude with respect to identifying and treating problems at an atomic level, digital and wireless technology is enabling healthcare professionals new and discrete methods for obtaining and filing crucial information.
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Épisode 2.3 L’alimentation
This man thinks he never has to eat again You know what’s a complete waste of time, money, and effort ? Eating. I mean, wouldn’t you rather just ingest a tasteless form of sustenance for the rest of your life and never have to go through that tedious rigmarole of opening and eating a premade sandwich or feasting on a pile of fried delicacies ever again ? Rob Rhinehart—a 24-year-old software engineer from Atlanta and, presumably, an impossibly busy man— thinks so. Rob found himself resenting the inordinate amount time it takes to fry an egg in the morning and decided something had to be done. Simplifying food as “nutrients required by the body to function” (which sounds totally bulimic, I know, but I promise it’s not), Rob has come up with an odorless beige cocktail that he’s named Soylent. Vice August 7 2013 by Monica Heisey
VICE: Hi, Rob. Why did you decide to boycott eating ? Rob Rhinehart: It was a combination of things. I was home for Christmas and saw an elderly family friend get admitted to the hospital after losing an unhealthy amount of weight. He was losing strength in one of his arms and found it very difficult to cook. I started wondering why something as simple and important as food was still so inefficient, given how streamlined and optimized other modern things are. I also had an incentive to live as cheaply as possible, and I yearned for the productivity benefit of being healthy. I’d been reading a lot of books on biology, and I started to think that it’s probably all the same to our cells whether it gets nutrients from a powder or a carrot. What was the next step ? Hacking the body is high risk, high reward. I read a textbook on physiological chemistry and took to the internet to see if I could find every known essential nutrient. My kitchen soon looked like a chemistry lab, and I had every unknown substance in a glass in front of me. I was a little worried it was going to kill me, but decided it was for science and quickly downed the whole thing. To my surprise, it was quite tasty, and I felt very energetic. For 30 days, I avoided food entirely, and I monitored the contents of my blood and my physical performance. Mental performance is harder to quantify, but I feel much sharper.
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So what’s in Soylent, exactly ? Everything the body needs—that we know of, anyway—vitamins, minerals, and macronutrients like essential amino acids, carbohydrates, and fat. For the fat, I just use olive oil and add fish oil. The carbs are an oligosaccharide, which is like sugar, but the molecules are longer, meaning it takes longer to metabolize and gives you a steady flow of energy for a longer period of time rather than a sugar rush from something like fructose or table sugar. I also add some nonessentials like antioxidants and probiotics and lately have been experimenting with nootropics.
What are some of the benefits to the food-free lifestyle ? Any drawbacks ? Not having to worry about food is fantastic. No groceries or dishes, no deciding what to eat, no endless conversations weighing the relative merits of gluten-free, keto, paleo, or vegan. Power and water bills are lower. I save hours a day and hundreds of dollars a month. I feel liberated from a crushing amount of repetitive drudgery. Soylent might also be good for people having trouble managing their weight. I find it very easy to lose and gain precise amounts of weight by varying the proportions in my drink. There are drawbacks: It doesn’t keep long after mixing with water, so I still have to make it every day. If I make a mistake with the amount of an ingredient, it can make me sick, but that hasn’t happened in a while. Also, some people really enjoy food a lot more than I do, so they may not like the idea. How could Soylent affect the world’s eating habits ? Consumer behavior has a lot to do with cost and convenience. There are plenty of ways to be healthy, but Americans are more likely to be overweight simply because the food that’s cheap and convenient is unhealthy. I think it’s possible to use technology to make healthy food very cheaply and easily, but we’ll have to give up many traditional foodstuffs like fresh fruits and veggies, which are incompatible with food processing and scale. That sounds ominous. I don’t think we need fruits and veggies, though—we need vitamins and minerals. We need carbs, not bread. Amino acids, not milk. It’s still fine to eat these when you want, but not everyone can afford them or has the desire to eat them. Food should be optimized and personalized. If Soylent was as cheap and easy to obtain as a cup of coffee, I think people would be much healthier and healthcare costs would be lower. And I think this is entirely possible. And it sounds like it could potentially help with world hunger. Yeah, I’m very optimistic at the prospect of helping developing nations. Soylent can largely be produced from the products of local agriculture, and at that scale, it’s plenty cheap to nourish even the
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La nourriture à l’échelle mondiale est rentrée dans un chaos indescriptible, qui justifie le nombre grandissant d’obèses contrasté avec des régions qui croulent sous la famine. Dans ce contexte, des solutions et des prises de conscience sont à trouver pour rééquilibrer ce déséquilibre alimentaire présent dans nos sociétés.
most impoverished individuals. People may giggle when I say I poop a lot less, but this would be a huge deal in the developing world, where inadequate sanitation is a prevalent source of disease. Also, agriculture has a huge impact on the environment, and this diet vastly reduces one’s use of it. Have you recieved much criticism since posting about your experiment on your blog ? At this point, I think skepticism is completely reasonable. There isn’t a lot of data right now, but I hope to change that. Interestingly, a lot of academics, nutritionists, MDs, and biologists have contacted me and been very optimistic—it’s the organic foodies who call me nasty things. Good skepticism is things like “You’re not getting any boron, and there is evidence boron is an essential nutrient.” That’s helpful, and I certainly advocate supplementing Soylent with conventional food. Bad skepticism is stuff like “This is stupid. You can’t live on powders and chemicals, you need healthy, fresh food !” Some people seem very invested in the idea of the sanctity of nature and natural food and some idyllic view of farming, so they find this idea very offensive. I don’t think that’s an evidence-based viewpoint. There’s no evidence organic food is healthier than conventional food, and you just can’t feed the world without efficient farming techniques. Do you think you’ll get bored of Soylent ? Soylent is definitely a permanent part of my diet. Right now I only eat one or two conventional meals a week, but if I had any money or a girlfriend, I would probably eat out more often. I’m quite happy with my bachelor chow. I don’t miss the rotary telephone, and I don’t miss food. You know in the film Soylent Green, Soylent Green is made of people, right ? Actually, in the original book Make Room ! Make Room !, Soylent is made of soya and lentil. The movie changed many aspects of the book, though it’s still one of my favorite movies. My Soylent is human free.
« L a révolution NBIC se compare à se qui s’est passé vers 1890
quand sont arrivées les technologiques aéronautiques, le telephone, l’automobile, l’électricité et la chimie.
C’est une révolution structurelle et convergentes, et à la différence de l’aéronautique, le téléphone et l’électricité, le sujet n’est pas la matière inanimée,
le sujet c’est la matière vivante, le sujet c’est l’Homme. Et nous allons progressivement devenir des êtres prototypes modifiés par la technologie. »
Épisode 3.1 La modification génétique
Nous vivrons mille ans Nous bénéficierons de technologies révolutionnaires : dépistages précoces des maladies, réparations de notre capital génétique, traitements ciblés des tumeurs et pose d’organes artificiels. A la fois réjouissant… et inquiétant, car nos gouvernants ne se rendent pas compte des métamorphoses qui nous attendent. Paris Match 6 Septembre 2013 by Catherine Schwaab
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Dans dix ans, nous serons tous « séquencés ». Les adultes des années 2025 auront leur patrimoine génétique – leur ADN – intégralement décrypté, ce qui n’est le cas aujourd’hui que d’un million d’hommes et de femmes dans le monde. Et encore, en 2013, ce séquençage reste incomplet. Notre ADN (pour acide désoxyribonucléique, la molécule support de notre information génétique héréditaire), comporte quelque 21 000 gènes, noyés dans 3 milliards de combinaisons (les paires de bases qui se singularisent par les lettres ATGC). « Les gènes représentent 1,5 % de notre ADN, précise le généticien Laurent Alexandre. Ce qu’on s’applique à explorer maintenant ce sont les « séquences régulatrices » des gènes, car une grande partie des variants génétiques qui expliquent nos maladies et ce que nous sommes ne sont pas dans nos gènes mais dans nos « zones régulatrices ». » Concrètement, où en est-on aujourd’hui ? On peut déjà lire le patrimoine génétique du fœtuspar une simple prise de sang de la mère, et repérer la trisomie 21 et d’autres maladies « génomiquement dépendantes ». Laurent Alexandre énumère : « La mucoviscidose, la maladie de Huntington, les myopathies, de nombreux handicaps mentaux, les maladies graves du cerveau qui touchent les enfants, certaines cécités et surdités, et beaucoup d’autres… des maladies
génétiques simples qui concernent 2 enfants sur 100. Je peux aussi voir certains gènes qui vont favoriser les mutations qui pourraient aboutir à un cancer : les fameux BRCA1, BRCA2 qui, à 70 %, induisent un cancer du sein, le gène du rétinoblastome (cancer de l’œil chez l’enfant), le syndrome de Lynch (cancer colorectal ou cancer de l’endomètre)… On en trouve des dizaines aujourd’hui. Ce qui est sûr, c’est qu’on peut repérer ces 20 % de risques de cancer de nature héréditaire. Nous allons bientôt pouvoir reprogrammer des gènes et même fabriquer des gènes artificiels par la biologie de synthèse. » C’est ce qu’on appelle la technique de réparation génétique des « méganucléases ou des Talen » : on « réécrit le texte » du gène malade. Mais il faut savoir hiérarchiser les données. Et surveiller les variants génétiques les plus importants. Pas les 8 000 dont je suis porteur sinon je passerais ma vie à l’hôpital ! » Quoi surveiller alors qu’on n’a pas encore tout exploré, que l’on n’est pas encore sûr des configurations dangereuses ? « Il faut des algorithmes et des systèmes experts qui permettent de hiérarchiser, de déterminer lesquels de ces variants néfastes sont à surveiller. On possède au niveau mondial des bases de données génétiques mutualisées, partagées. Tout ce qu’on fait en génomique se fonde sur ces « Wikipédia » du gène. Toutes les données de mutation forment des bases de données ouvertes. Si chaque labo dans le monde ne devait travailler que sur ses propres données, il n’y aurait pas de génomique. Dans mon labo, quand je vous séquence, je regarde votre ADN, je le décrypte, j’aligne les lettres codées ATTCGA…, puis je vous compare à Human Reference 19 (on en est à la 19e version du standard mondial). Je vais trouver entre 1 et 3 millions de différences entre Human Reference et vous. Par exemple, sur telle séquence, vous êtes A, Human Reference est T… Je regarde dans les bases de données si la mutation est connue et quelle est la signification de vos différences : positive, négative, neutre ou inconnue. Inconnue ? Alors on dépose ce variant sur la base mondiale. » Ce qui s’appelle un travail en équipe et une émulation… planétaire ! Pour autant, les généticiens le savent, on a beau être séquencé au maximum des possibilités existantes, on n’appartient pas à la génération qui vivra mille ans,ni même deux cents ans. Cependant, si Laurent Alexandre contracte un cancer, il aura les moyens de cibler son traitement plus finement que les autres mortels. « L’avenir, c’est le séquençage de la tumeur. Cela permet de personnaliser le traitement chimio-thérapeutique ; mieux ciblé, il sera moins lourd en effets secondaires. Le séquençage des tumeurs est déjà en vigueur dans tous les grands centres médicaux américains. » L’un des premiers Américains à avoir fait séquencer sa tumeur fut Steve Jobs, le fondateur d’Apple. « Il est mort parce qu’il n’a pas voulu écouter
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Nous cherchons toujours à améliorer l’espèce humaine par tous les moyens possibles et inimaginables. Ces avancés souvent lourdement critiquées, puis acceptées et enfin banalisées, sont de plus en plus pointues et permettent à l’humain d’être plus resistant. Est ce que la modification génétique est l’ultime étape à atteindre ?
les médecins. S’il avait suivi leurs préconisations, il serait encore là. » Quand on lui diagnostique un cancer du pancréas, les chirurgiens insistent : « Il faut opérer tout de suite ! » Jobs refuse, préférant se soigner par les médecines douces, homéopathie, diététique, etc. Neuf mois plus tard, il ne va pas mieux. A son chevet, les meilleurs médecins, chirurgiens, généticiens finissent par le convaincre de se faire opérer. Il finit par accepter. Trop tard. Les métastases ont envahi son organisme. Laurent Alexandre a suivi l’évolution : « Il avait pourtant fait séquencer sa tumeur, bénéficiait de traitements ciblés sous forme de thérapie génique. Il avait les meilleurs généticiens (Stanford, Johns Hopkins, le MIT, Harvard, le Broad Institute !), avait appris la génétique, assistait à toutes les réunions pluridisciplinaires qui déterminaient les cibles à attaquer sur sa tumeur. Il a fallu lui enlever le foie… S’il avait suivi les conseils des médecins, il serait guéri aujourd’hui. » Que l’on ait les moyens de Steve Jobs ou ceux d’un patient américain lambda, la guérison n’est pas assurée en l’état actuel des connaissances. « Décrypter la tumeur améliore les chances de survie, mais il y a un frein, modère Laurent Alexandre. On n’a pas encore tous les médicaments qui ciblent toutes les mutations cellulaires. Ça va arriver progressivement. Il faut attendre encore une quinzaine d’années. » En écoutant ces chercheurs, on est partagé entre jubilation et inquiétude.Alors que les débats en France se focalisent autour du droit à l’enfant, qui s’intéresse aux implications de ces manipulations génétiques ? Qui, au gouvernement, saura même y comprendre quelque chose ? Là, Laurent Alexandre devient vert de rage : « La France a cinq ans de retard sur l’Amérique parce que nos énarques sont technophobes ! Pas un ingénieur au gouvernement ! Que des juristes, des apparatchiks, des bureaucrates. Pas un seul ne sait vous donner une définition correcte de l’ADN, des NBIC, il faut leur expliquer : « Nanotechnologies, biotechnologies, informatique, cognitives »... Les énarques ont pris le pouvoir sur les polytechniciens dans l’appareil d’Etat. Ainsi, la Corée mettra bientôt 5 % de son PIB dans la recherche, alors que la France arrive péniblement à 2 %. Nos élites n’ont pas compris que la guerre de demain sera technologique et qu’on est en train de la perdre. La découverte du virus du sida par l’institut Pasteur c’était il y a trente ans. Aujourd’hui, nous sommes très en retard ! » s’énerve ce scientifique pourtant énarque. Et pourquoi ne pas trouver les mots pour les convaincre, d octeur ? « Leur haine de la technologie est hors de toute ressource thérapeutique, grince-t-il. On perd du temps sur la fiscalité et on se désintéresse de la recherche technologique. En 2025, sur ce plan, on sera plus près du Maroc que de la Corée. D’ailleurs, avez-vous remarqué sur les photos que nos présidents n’ont jamais d’ordinateur sur leur bureau ? ! »
La reproduction humaine est restée inchangée depuis toujours. C’est qu’au XXe et XXIe siècle qu’on a vraiment commencé à la modifier avec la contraception, la fécondation in vitro et l’interruption volontaire de grossesse. Mais tout ça n’est que le début. Des avancées incroyables sont en train de voir le jour qui vont sans doute changer notre façon de procréer nos générations futures.
Épisode 3.2 La reproduction
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Scientists generate sperm from skin cells of infertile men IFLScience.com May 2 2014 by Justine Alford
Scientists have managed to use stem cells derived from the skin of infertile males to produce sperm precursor cells. The study, which has been published in Cell Reports, gives hope that one day scientists may be able to produce sperm that could be used to overcome fertility problems in certain men. Infertility affects around 10-15% of couples, and mutations on the Y chromosome that affect sperm production are surprisingly common. Specifically, many men have alterations in the gene AZF which can lead to a variety of effects such as the complete absence of sperm or very low sperm counts. In this particular study, scientists took skin samples from 3 infertile men with mutations in the AZF gene and 2 fertile men as controls. The infertile men did not produce any sperm, a condition known as azoospermia. They then used these skin cells, called dermal fibroblasts, in order to produce induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs). iPSCs are cells that possess the ability to turn into virtually any type of cell in the body. They transplanted these unspecialized iPSCs into a particular part of the testes of mice called the seminiferous tubules, which are where gametes (reproductive cells) are created. They found that the stem cells differentiated into sperm-like precursor cells which were very similar to fetal germ cells. Germ cells are the cells that give rise to gametes. These germ-like cells did not, however, go on to form mature sperm cells, probably because of differences between humans and mice. Another unfortunate observation was that cells that left the tubules went on to form tumors in the mice, which obviously represents a major safety problem. They also found that the stem cells from the fertile men were better at differentiating into germ cells than those from infertile men, although the fact that the cells from infertile men could produce germ-like cells at all was impressive since AZF mutations sometimes cause a complete absence of germ cells. While it is still certainly early days, this study raises hope that with fine tuning, scientists may eventually be able to develop germ cells that could help men with fertility problems. This study may also serve as a model that could help to further our knowledge of the formation of sperm cells in the fetus, allowing scientists to understand what happens very early on in development. Future work may focus on replicating this study in more closely related animals, such as nonhuman primates, which could yield more promising results.
Beaucoup l’ont déjà prédit dans une multitude de romans et films de science fiction. Mais l’utérus artificiel est sûrement le comble de la nature. Délocaliser le lieux de la gestation semble un défi insurmontable d’un point de vue technolgique, éthique et philosophique. Cela dit des chercheurs sont déjà en train de trouver des solutions.
New York Times September 29 1996 by Perri Klass
’One by one the eggs were transferred from their test-tubes to the larger containers; deftly the peritoneal lining was slit, the morula dropped into place, the saline solution poured . . . and already the bottle had passed on through an opening in the wall, slowly on into the Social Predestination Room.’’ Aldous Huxley, ‘’Brave New World’’ The artificial womb exists. In Tokyo, researchers have developed a technique called EUFI -- extrauterine fetal incubation. They have taken goat fetuses, threaded catheters through the large vessels in the umbilical cord and supplied the fetuses with oxygenated blood while suspending them in incubators that contain artificial amniotic fluid heated to body temperature. Yoshinori Kuwabara, chairman of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Juntendo University in Tokyo, has been working on artificial placentas for a decade. His interest grew out of his clinical experience with premature infants, and as he writes in a recent abstract, ‘’It goes without saying that the ideal situation for the immature fetus is growth within the normal environment of the maternal organism.’’ Kuwabara and his associates have kept the goat fetuses in this environment for as long as three weeks. But the doctor’s team ran into problems with circulatory failure, along with many other technical difficulties. Pressed to speculate on the future, Kuwabara cautiously predicts that ‘’it should be possible to extend the length’’ and, ultimately, ‘’this can be applied to human beings.’’ For a moment, as you contemplate those fetal goats, it may seem a short hop to the Central Hatchery of Aldous Huxley’s imagination. In fact, in recent decades, as medicine has focused on the beginning and end stages of pregnancy, the essential time inside the woman’s body has been reduced. We are, however, still a long way from connecting those two points, from creating a completely artificial gestation. But we are at a moment when the fetus, during its obligatory time in the womb, is no longer inaccessible, no longer locked away from medical interventions.
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The future of human reproductive medicine lies along the speeding trajectories of several different technologies. There is neonatology, accomplishing its miracles at the too-abrupt end of gestation. There is fetal surgery, intervening dramatically during pregnancy to avert
L’utérus artificiel
the anomalies that kill and cripple newborns. There is the technology of assisted reproduction, the in-vitro fertilization and gamete retrieval-and-transfer fireworks of the last 20 years. And then, inevitably, there is genetics. All these technologies are essentially new, and with them come ethical questions so potent that the very inventors of these miracles seem half-afraid of where we may be heading. Modern neonatology is a relatively short story: a few decades of phenomenal advances and doctors who resuscitate infants born 16 or 17 weeks early, babies weighing less than a pound. These very low-birthweight babies have a survival rate of about 10 percent. Experienced neonatologists are extremely hesitant about pushing the boundaries back any further; much research is aimed now at reducing the severe morbidity of these extreme preemies who do survive. ‘’Liquid preserves the lung structure and function,’’ says Thomas Shaffer, professor of physiology and pediatrics at the School of Medicine at Temple University. He has been working on liquid ventilation for almost 30 years. Back in the late 1960’s, he looked for a way to use liquid ventilation to prevent decompression sickness in deep-sea divers. His technology was featured in the book ‘’The Abyss,’’ and for the movie of that name, Hollywood built models of the devices Shaffer had envisioned. As a postdoctoral student in physiology, he began working with premature infants. Throughout gestation, the lungs are filled with the appropriately named fetal lung fluid. Perhaps, he thought, ventilating these babies with a liquid that held a lot of oxygen would offer a gentler, safer way to take these immature lungs over the threshold toward the necessary goal of breathing air. Barotrauma, which is damage done to the lungs by the forced air banging out of the ventilator, would thus be reduced or eliminated. Today, in Shaffer’s somewhat labyrinthine laboratories in Philadelphia, you can come across a ventilator with pressure settings that seem astoundingly low; this machine is set at pressures that could never force air into stiff newborn lungs. And then there is the long bubbling cylinder where a special fluorocarbon liquid can be passed through oxygen, picking up and absorbing quantities of oxygen molecules. This machine fills the lungs with fluid that flows into the tiny passageways and air sacs of a premature human lung. Shaffer
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Épisode 3.3
remembers, not long ago, when many people thought the whole idea was crazy, when his was the only team working on filling human lungs with liquid. Now, liquid ventilation is cited by many neonatologists as the next large step in treating premature infants. In 1989, the first human studies were done, offering liquid ventilation to infants who were not thought to have any chance of survival through conventional therapy. The results were promising, and bigger trials are now under way. A pharmaceutical company has developed a fluorocarbon liquid that has the capacity to carry a great deal of dissolved oxygen and carbon dioxide -- every 100 milliliters holds 50 milliliters of oxygen. By putting liquid into the lung, Shaffer and his colleagues argue, the lung sacs can be expanded at a much lower pressure. ‘’I wouldn’t want to push back the gestational age limit,’’ Shaffer says. ‘’I want to eliminate the damage.’’ He says he believes that this technology may become the standard. By the year 2000, these techniques may be available in large centers. Pressed to speculate about the more distant future, he imagines a premature baby in a liquid-dwelling and a liquid-breathing intermediate stage between womb and air: Immersed in fluid that would eliminate insensible water loss you would need a sophisticated temperature-control unit, a ventilator to take care of the respiratory exchange part, better thermal control and skin care. The notion that you could perform surgery on a fetus was pioneered by Michael Harrison at the University of California in San Francisco. Guided by an improved ultrasound technology, it was he who reported, in 1981, that surgical intervention to relieve a urinary tract obstruction in a fetus was possible. ‘’I was frustrated taking care of newborns,’’ says N. Scott Adzick, who trained with Harrison and is surgeon in chief at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. When children are born with malformations, damage is often done to the organ systems before birth; obstructive valves in the urinary system cause fluid to back up and destroy the kidneys, or an opening in the diaphragm allows loops of intestine to move up into the chest and crowd out the lungs. ‘’It’s like a lot of things in medicine,’’ Adzick says, ‘’if you’d only gotten there earlier on, you could have prevented the damage. I felt it might make sense to treat certain life-threatening malformations before birth.
« N ous sommes à la phase de transition entre aujourd’hui et 2025
oĂš nous terminons le dĂŠcryptage du vivant et nous rentrons dans le bricolage du vivant.
C’est un champ prodigieux qui va dÊployer ses effets non pas en 2014,
mais 2020, 2030, 2040 et qui va nous donner un pouvoir illimité sur notre nature biologique là encore. »
Je remércie grandement Michel Maidenberg pour l’aide et le soutient apporté tout au long de ce projet. Modèle : Camille Lemaitre @ Mademoiselle Make Up & Hair : Faustine Hornok @ Backstage Le texte qui accompagne les grandes photos est extrait d’une conférence de Laurent Alexandre Impression : Color Print / Suisse Imprimerie © David Cocciante 2014
Dans un monde où tout va exponentiellement très vite, Momentum regroupe les technologies qui vont métamorphoser nos sociétés dans ce demi siècle à venir. De l’intelligence artificielle à la modification génétique, il est important de se mettre au courant de toutes ces nouvelles technologies qui pourraient voir le jour plus tôt qu’on ne le pense.