Friday, January 25, 2008
First synthetized human genome by year 2014
But synthetic biologists are also planning to scale up from the simplest organisms to the most complex: human beings. The first bacterial genome was sequenced in 1995 and was followed by the landmark sequencing of the human genome in 2001. Based on that trajectory, Voigt estimated that a synthetic human genome -- which could be used in human cloning research -- could be created by 2014.
But before researchers can do that level of synthetic biology, scientists will need to automate their methods. Beyond this work, Voigt said, scientists will need programming tools, in the same way computer scientists use higher level programming languages like Fortran, C++ and Java, to control computer function.
"(Otherwise it's like) writing Vista in binary," he said. "It's just not going to happen."
