January 13, 2015
Written by Quinn Minten
Written by Quinn Minten
A new startup company, Cambrian Genomics, has
enabled the average citizen to modify or create DNA, literally inventing
new life forms. Cambrian, the brainchild of Austin Heinz, has found
funding from a variety of venture capitalists, raising $10 million
to expand the business. Currently, most of Cambrian’s orders come from
pharmaceutical companies, but anyone with the money — not an enormous
expense, only five to six cents per DNA letter — can design and print
whatever their imagination wishes.
Heinz views the technology as more than just the
science fiction it would seem to be; he believes it will one day be
possible to design and print modified humans — basically, to make
designer babies. Of course, the power to design new life raises
important ethical issues, and has not just a few people alarmed. As it
stands, there are several major problems with the future which Heinz has
envisioned.
First, there is currently no real regulation on the technology Cambrian uses. Though the government, in the form
of the Food and Drug Administration, plays a certain role in regulating
genetic modification, there is not at present a set of definite rules
for the modifications enabled by Cambrian. Namely, because it is not the
company itself that is modifying organisms, but rather, the third-party
who orders them, current laws will not cover Cambrian’s business. This
allows anyone with a little money to create absolutely anything,
regardless of whether it is actually safe or not; a design for, say, a
real-life werewolf might be interesting, but probably not a good thing
to let run around. Unless Cambrian itself takes part in regulating the
creation of what people want to invent, an unlikely possibility given
Heinz’s beliefs about trying to “democratize creation,” then there is no
one out there — yet — to prevent what is imagined from literally
running wild.
SNIP
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