Talk:Hazards of synthetic biology

Mirror life dangers, including "kill us all", 2016 synthesized mirror polymerase
We are slowly approaching synthesis of first mirror-image cells ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_life ) - built of mirror versions of standard molecules (enantiomers). For example while functional large mirror proteins seemed a big difficulty a few years ago, in 2016 there was synthesized first functional mirror polymerase: https://www.nature.com/news/mirror-image-enzyme-copies-looking-glass-dna-1.19918

Here is 2010 Wired article: "Mirror-image cells could transform science - or kill us all" regarding dangers of mirror cyanobacteria, which due to nearly incompatible natural enemies could dominate e.g. our oceans: https://www.wired.com/2010/11/ff_mirrorlife/

As mirror versions of biomolecules are often toxic due to unpredictable interactions, like in thalidomide case, other mirror microbes might already turn out extremely dangerous. Bacteria are known to be able to adapt to consumption of opposite chirality sugars (e.g. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4160389/ ), and mirror ones could populate some ecological niches due to nearly no natural enemies.

Mirror life needs a special attention regarding "Hazards of synthetic biology" - maybe it deserves a separate section in this article? Jarek Duda (talk) 12:14, 2 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Mirror life would fall under the category of xenobiology and would have much of the same impacts, both in terms of hazards and for use as intrinsic biocontainment. The sources I've looked at tend to emphasize xeno nucleic acids and I haven't seen much treatment of mirror life.  If you could suggest a source I'll take a look at it.  Due to Wikipedia's content guidelines (see Reliable_sources), secondary sources such as review articles in peer-reviewed journals, or guidance documents from government health agencies, are strongly preferred.  Popular science articles and even primary research articles aren't preferred, which is much different from writing in other contexts.  John P. Sadowski (NIOSH) (talk) 08:00, 21 May 2019 (UTC)


 * There are peer-reviewed articles regarding realized synthesis of e.g. mirror polymerase in 2016. There are authorities warning about this possibility in popular science articles, like Jack Szostak and George Church in the 2010 Wired article. However, reliable understanding of consequences of synthesizing e.g. the first mirror cells, seems extremely difficult, we might wait for such peer-reviewed papers more than for this synthesis. Should it be ignored since then? Jarek Duda (talk) 08:34, 21 May 2019 (UTC)