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Synthetic Biology: Engineering Genetic Material of Organisms

By Atyaani Bhattacharya

We have a number of problems, and our biggest one comes from our plastic pollution. 350 million tons of plastic wasted yearly and globally! Imagine that we can take some microorganisms, change the function of their DNA to be able to consume plastic, and be able to decrease the amount of plastic that is increasingly collecting throughout the world in millions of tons.  Imagine engineering microorganisms and enzymes to fix the problems of our globe. This is called synthetic biology, which seeks to apply the principles of engineering to biological systems and processes. Synthetic biology alters DNA structure of organisms to solve problems globally, in every field. 

A Deeper Understanding About Synthetic Biology

What exactly is Synthetic Biology? Synthetic Biology applies engineering principles to develop new biological parts, devices, and systems or to redesign existing systems found in nature. Synthetic biology can improve every field – from being able to kill cancer cells without killing the healthy ones around them, to being able to engineer trees to provide non-flammable homes, and many other ways. Just a few examples of synthetic Biology include: modifying the DNA of rice to produce a nutrient in carrots that can prevent vitamin A deficiency, programming microbes to produce medicines found in nature, etc. In summary, synthetic biology applies engineering principles to biological organisms and systems.

Synthetic Biology in Fashion

Spider Silk has always astonished scientists and how they are as strong as steel, but also extremely flexible and light. Currently, Fuzhong Zhang, a professor of energy, environmental and chemical engineering at the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis has been able to discover a way to create synthetic spider silk with synthetic biology to create a new era of sustainable clothing production. If this new synthetic spider silk were to be used as a renewable resource, since the fashion industry uses renewable resources incredibly, it would be producing an estimated 100 billion garments and 92 million tons of waste each year. “…Zhang has created new spider silk fusion proteins, called bi-terminal Mfp fused silks (btMSilks). Microbial production of btMSilks have eightfold higher yields than recombinant silk proteins, and the btMSilk fibers have substantially improved strength and toughness while being lightweight.” (ScienceDaily.com). As a result, we can see that synthetic biology can be used in the fashion industry to synthesize a material to make it more renewable and in general advance and improve the fashion industry.

Synthetic Biology in the Medical Field

Synthetic Biology can help to target cancer cells without damaging the nearby healthy cells. This is one of the ways that synthetic biology can improve and help discover more in the medical field. Coming back to cancer cells, according to ScienceDaily.com, “Synthetic proteins engineered to recognize overly active biological pathways can kill cancer cells while sparing their healthy peers, according to a study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine.” Now we have a general idea of how synthetic biology can recognize cancer cells and leave the healthy cells alone. They made two proteins to be able to recognize cancer cells and leave alone healthy ones – “The first is activated in the presence of an “always on” growth signal often found in cancer cells, and the second carries out a researcher-programmed response, such as triggering the expression of genes involved in cell death.” (ScienceDaily.com). Increasingly, with more experience and experiments the scientists are trying to make this strategy possible as an option to get rid of cancer, saying “Although the experiments were confined to cells grown in the laboratory, the researchers believe the results could lead to a new type of cancer therapy in which synthetic proteins deliver highly targeted and customizable treatments to sidestep the sometimes devastating side effects of current options.” (ScienceDaily.com) In a nutshell, we can see that synthetic biology can help us to kill cancer cells, however still keep the healthy cells unharmed. This is how synthetic biology can improve the medical field. 

Advantages of Synthetic Biology

We saw synthetic biology in different fields and the different aspects of this field. What are the advantages? According to hudsonrobotics.com, “Synthetic biology is useful in pharmaceutical development…allows for the production of valuable small molecules that are difficult to synthesize with chemical engineering or harvest naturally…Synthetic biology has great potential in a personalized medicine approach to fighting cancer…Using living systems as a natural bio-factory to develop drug compounds or fuel ingredients eliminates the industrial waste of a purely chemical manufacturing process…” These are just the few advantages of synthetic biology out of the number of pros. All in all, we can see the number of ways that Synthetic biology can improve our lifestyles in general, help solve worldwide problems, and ameliorate different fields of study and industries.

Disadvantages of Synthetic Biology

Throughout this blog post, synthetic biology was mainly discussed as an advantage to the world. But as many new discoveries go, there are always disadvantages that come along with them. Hudsonrobotics.com notes that some ethicists worry synthetic biology could lead to dangerous organisms being maliciously released and that commercializing these technologies might create conflicts between biotechnology companies and rural farmers. Critics also fear that efficient synthetic biology organisms could reduce demand for conventional crops, harming small farms (hudsonrobotics.com). Additionally, there are ethical concerns about genetic disorders and potential inequality in genome editing. Overall, while synthetic biology offers significant benefits, it also raises important ethical and practical concerns.

As we can see, many of the disadvantages of synthetic biology come out to be related to the ethical aspect of things. These are just a few samples of the disadvantages and worried questions that synthetic biology brings to people. As a final thought, synthetic biology can improve our world in several ways, but also is faced with the disadvantages that people fear from this field.

A Brief Summary: Conclusion

George Washington Carver once said, “Education is the key to unlock a golden door of freedom.” By reading this article, you have now opened a new door of biology and engineering. A new field of understanding. By reading this article, you have shown your love to learn. You have understood the real-world appliances of this field of study. You have understood the advantages and the outnumbered disadvantages. Synthetic biology is still a pretty recent field of study, and we encourage you to delve into the magical world of science. I hope you learned something valuable and can use it as an encouragement to the world of science. 

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