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Re: Scientists Build First Man-Made Genome; Synthetic Life Comes Next

by Matthew Miller-2 :: Rate this Message:

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On Fri, Jan 25, 2008 at 05:18:03PM +1300, Apptech wrote:

> My cousin Matthew forwarded me this reference.
> I was sure that it would just be more of the rubbish that pervades this
> topic but decided to have a quick look to confirm my suppositions.
>
> The not quite smiling face of Craig Venter that heads the article told me
> immediately that this is, after all, the real thing.
> We stand on the bridge at Khazad-dûm. The not distant enough drums sound
> their doom-doom call and it's not certain, yet, if Venter is himself the
> Balrog or if he is soon to conjure it from the abyss. As he's one of my
> select group of (anti?-)heroes I can't complain all too much.
>
> If you can't make head nor tail of that wait a few years and it will be the
> only news going :-).
>
>             http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2008/01/synthetic_genome?currentPage=all

It's likely that in a decade or two (who knows, maybe sooner) that biology
will be a growing, in demand field in about the same way computer science
is/was. I think that it's pretty cool to think about programming genomes
instead of computers. My advice to new freshman: major in biology and minor
in CS. :)

Matt

--
...those who search for, or imagine they have found, the perpetual motion,
are always men to whom the most certain and invariable truths in mechanics
are unknown.  -- Jacques Ozanam (1640-1717)
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