GENETICS : CREATING A CELL WITH SYNTHETIC DNA


Genetics: Creating a cell with synthetic DNA
United States - John Craig Venter, an American biologist shows for his research in genome sequencing, has managed his teams to create the first bacterium with a fully synthetic genome.

This bacterium has been made from the sequencing of the genome of the bacterium Mycoplasma mycoides. It's been 15 years since researchers at the J. Craig Venter Institute in Maryland, harnessed to the task. The cell contains more than one million base pairs, which is low compared to six billion contained in the human genome.

This is a great advance in the field of genetics, this research could lead to the design of artificial life forms that could help produce biofuels or pharmaceuticals. Important ethical issues arise, however, due to possible drifts around this technique.

Scanning electron micrographs of M. mycoides
More information can be found on the J. Craig Venter Institute web site at: http://www.jcvi.org/cms/research/projects/first-self-replicating-synthetic-bacterial-cell/

Journal Reference:
Daniel G. Gibson, John I. Glass, Carole Lartigue, Vladimir N. Noskov, Ray-Yuan Chuang, Mikkel A. Algire, Gwynedd A. Benders, Michael G. Montague, Li Ma, Monzia M. Moodie, Chuck Merryman, Sanjay Vashee, Radha Krishnakumar, Nacyra Assad-Garcia, Cynthia Andrews-Pfannkoch, Evgeniya A. Denisova, Lei Young, Zhi-Qing Qi, Thomas H. Segall-Shapiro, Christopher H. Calvey, Prashanth P. Parmar, Clyde A. Hutchison III, Hamilton O. Smith, and J. Craig Venter. Creation of a Bacterial Cell Controlled by a Chemically Synthesized Genome. Science, May 20, 2010 DOI: 10.1126 / science.1190719

1 comments:

Lenny said...

probably can expect a human with synthetic DNA..

Post a Comment

Type your comments here

Followers

My Favorite Links!