‘Unprecedented risk’ to life on Earth: Scientists call for halt on ‘mirror life’ microbe research
‘Unprecedented risk’ to life on Earth: Scientists call for halt on ‘mirror life’ microbe research
Experts warn that mirror bacteria, constructed from mirror images of molecules found in nature, could put humans, animals and plants at risk of lethal infections
Summary
Leading scientists, including Nobel laureates, are urging a halt to research on creating “mirror life” microbes, citing “unprecedented risks” to life on Earth.
Mirror microbes, built from reversed molecular structures, could evade natural immune systems, leading to uncontrollable lethal infections.
While mirror molecules hold potential for medical and industrial uses, researchers warn that mirror organisms could escape containment and resist antibiotics.
A 299-page report in Science advocates banning such research until safety can be ensured and calls for global debate on its ethical and ecological implications.
Hey babe, wake up. A new human-created, extinction-level event just dropped.
We just need to make mirror people that live in the mirror microbe side of the world
Yeah, we need more conflict. We'll create the ultimate "them" for us to "us" against. Contact with them is literally lethal! Can't get more conflict than that... yet.
Meh, we get a new one of those every year now. They'll have to try harder to impress me.
Fuck, again?
Oh for fuck's sake, we already know that mirror molecules can have disastrously unexpected side-effects on people, so why on Earth would we make an entire mirror organism that's has the potential to do the same but way, way worse!
I know I just responded, but I read the article, and the drug page, and discovered the thing we're talking about. Racemic organic molecules are not the same thing here.
These are specifically proteins used for cellular life. These are significantly more complex, as there are no natural bindings between the two. To note this from Wikipedia:
Examples include thalidomide, ibuprofen, cetirizine and salbutamol. A well known drug that has different effects depending on its ratio of enantiomers is amphetamine. Adderall is an unequal mixture of both amphetamine enantiomers. A single Adderall dose combines the neutral sulfate salts of dextroamphetamine and amphetamine, with the dextro isomer of amphetamine saccharate and D/L-amphetamine aspartate monohydrate. The original Benzedrine was a racemic mixture, and isolated dextroamphetamine was later introduced to the market as Dexedrine. The prescription analgesic tramadol is also a racemate.
We know that those drugs aren't great in pregnancy, but Adderall specifically does not cause birth defects. Again, these molecules are significantly less complex than any protein they would talk about here.
I know they're not directly related, but my point, as I said to @skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de, is that we already know even simple mirroring molecules can do to living things, nevermind complex proteins and entire organisms.
lf there's no proper safeguards, it could do unimaginable damage (which is also why I used Thalidomide as an example, as it inspired literally tonnes of safeguards post-scandel).
Like GMOs can be dangerous as is, but at least in most instances it's only the living organism itself that's dangerous. With mirroring, any part of that organism could be dangerous to normal lifeforms, so even sterilised mirror waste could be dangerous
I don't see any mention in there of Thalidomide being a mirror molecule, do you have a source for that?
Fair. I had thought that article with the scandel would mention it, but apparently doesn't. Only the main article does.
It has two possible configurations:
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The Right handed configuration had the desired effects and isn't harmful.
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The Left handed mirror caused birth defects.
Oh and the best part is, if you try to make a pure mixture of the right handed version, it can convert to the left handed one in the body!
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why on Earth would we make an entire mirror organism that’s has the potential to do the same but way, way worse
it's in the article: because of fAsCiNaTiOn!
Well that answers my question if mirror cells need mirror molecules.
They just die and break apart turning into mirror molecules. Oh well.
Mirror molecules that by themselves could easily pose a risk to anyone exposed by them.
My point in even mentioning Thalidomide was that we already know what mirroring even a simple compound can do to living things, nevermind complex proteins and entire organisms.
GMOs can be dangerous as is without proper safeguards, but at least in most instances it's only the living organism itself that's dangerous. With mirroring, any part of that organism could be dangerous to normal lifeforms, so even sterilised mirror waste could be dangerous
This sounds horrifying, but if they do make them I hope they all have little goaties.
A 299-page report in Science advocates banning such research until safety can be ensured and calls for global debate on its ethical and ecological implications
Which will not be read or followed!
Weeeeee! Maybe i die of superflu instead of hunger or jackboot
Yeah, this should probably be approached from the angle of "someone might do this, so we should do research to be prepared".
Research ways to improve containment to reduce the chance of an accidental containment breach.
And research ways to quickly determine the weaknesses of such synthetic lifeforms if a breach happens anyways. Also to be prepared in case someone deliberately weaponizes it.
By the way, this kind of thing is why IMO if we ever do find extra terrestrial life, attempting to make any kind of physical contact or even land on the planet might end up dooming both our own species (and maybe all current complex life on Earth) as well as any complex life on that other planet. They could have basic forms of life that are entirely different from our own and completely invisible to our immune systems.
Though it would probably also have cool results in a few hundred million years, after microbial life has evolved defenses and perhaps some hybridizations.
If the world wants it banned, you can be sure China and Russia are working on it in secret labs, maybe USA too anyway.
Like when the UN banned buying uranium from apartheid south Africa mines but everyone kept buying anyway
What if we kissed with molecules of opposite chirality?
Yeah, knowing how fucky simple protein molecules can get when you flip the chirality (prions, which are essentially the root cause of Alzheimer’s and CJD and a few other neurodegenerative conditions), making whole-ass microbes on that principle without understanding what that could even mean sounds like a WILDLY insane idea.
Not to nit but we absolutely do not know the root cause of Alzheimer’s disease. Not that prions are good or anything.
Yeah, sorry, didn’t mean to imply that’s all that is going on with Alzheimer’s, but I was under the impression that prion formation/presence in neurological tissue was extremely highly correlated with the condition, though the precise mechanism of their effects aren’t yet well understood. Then again, I haven’t seriously looked into that stuff since my grandfather passed from it a while ago.
As always, some people see Jurassic Park as inspiration and wonder why nobody gave Hammond a chance.
The rest of us know that Dr. Malcolm was right from the start.
Prions aren't a chirality issue, they're a folding issue
Prions are comprised of right-handed amino acids. I don't think it's the same thing to flip the chirality of a molecule as to flip the chirality of its subcomponents. DNA is usually right-handed, but there are left-handed forms created naturally. They don't suddenly annihilate their counterparts in antimatter-like collisions.
There are natural pharmaceuticals that consist of both chiralities, and obviously plenty of synthetic ones.
It's really not that simple. If we want to think about it longer, fine by me. But what is the real threat level?
Edit: As others have pointed out, prions also aren't an example of a different chirality of the native protein. The issue with prions is they can convert the native protein to their form, which "reproduces" themselves to make the disease progress. Mirrored organisms will propagate the chirality of their components, but their components don't inherently convert their enantiomers once that organism is dead.
Why we need a moon base with an unconnected section where everything is done by robots
Yea, I'd definitely trust us with that... we could probably get one of our highly trust worthy billionaires to run it.
Maybe we could equip this moon base equipped with civilization ending microbes with a giant laser just in case sending the bio weapon back to earth seems too expensive to the board members?
Regardless of whether such an organism is a danger, there's no way we can even come close to creating an entire organism with an opposite chirality in just a decade. That would require somehow synthesizing every chiral component of the organism (proteins, enzymes, DNA, etc) from scratch which is completely impossible with current or near future technology.
I've been out of synthetic bio for damn near two decades now, and an undergrad when was I even in it, but I'm not so sure. PCR didn't come around until 85. I had professors that used to do every cycle manually. Human genome project wrapped in 03(?). You can order custom oligos for like $0.13USD a base pair mail order now. You type it in on a webform, a machine creates a custom molecule for you, and if you want to pay a little extra you can have it over-night. I suppose it depends what you call "near future", and synthetic biology has always had moving goal posts when it came to "functional liposome" and "synthetic life", but I don't know... shit can move fast sometimes.
Should we treat this any differently than the way we treat research with dangerous pathogens?
Because apparently the only way to get rid of it is extreme incineration.
This isn't viral or bacterial, where just a little bit of heat, UV or decay will kill it.
When someone dies of prion disease, they need to incinerate everything. Clothes/Body/Beds, the whole thing.
These are nightmare fuel.
UV or heat, or ethylene oxide and a number of other things still would kill wrong chirality bacteria, these are not prions, where are you people are getting this from
Exactly this!
For the most part Pathogens and even GMOs are only present an environmental threat in their living form, and once properly sterilised, can be disposed of safely.
These mirror organisms would be dangerous in living and dead form, as they'd be chuck full of mirror proteins and biological molescules, any of which could trigger an environmental disaster if released by accident, so they'd have to be completely destroyed to be safe.
Without proper regulations to ensure proper safeguards are in place, continued research into these organisms is plain dangerous
even the most impotent limp dicked authoritarian gets a raging boner over tech that will cause mass human death. the more apocalyptic, the better. as such, this might just be the only research that will be govt funded in the near future
Just wait until we start making mirror vaccines, the antivax folks heads will explode.
Remember Boeing whistleblower Joshua Dean?
I also remember Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck, but they’re unrelated to this as well.
Because when you discover something exceptionally dangerous the best approach is to halt research? To purposefully deprive yourself of understanding what it is and how it works and effects and interactions? Wouldn't you want more research, just under more strict protocols?
Do you assume these scientists are fearful anti-intellectuals, like a gaggle of Covidiots or something? If you read the article, you'll find that
The expert group includes Dr Craig Venter, the US scientist who led the private effort to sequence the human genome in the 1990s, and the Nobel laureates Prof Greg Winter at the University of Cambridge and Prof Jack Szostak at the University of Chicago.
These aren't idiots, and their call came from a risk assessment performed by experts in their fields.
While enthusiastic about research on mirror molecules, the report sees substantial risks in mirror microbes and calls for a global debate on the work. link to the 299-page report
Beyond causing lethal infections, the researchers doubt the microbes could be safely contained or kept in check by natural competitors and predators.
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Dr Kate Adamala, a synthetic biologist at the University of Minnesota and co-author on the report, was working towards a mirror cell but changed tack last year after studying the risks in detail.
“We should not be making mirror life,” she said. “We have time for the conversation. And that’s what we were trying to do with this paper, to start a global conversation.”
“Unless compelling evidence emerges that mirror life would not pose extraordinary dangers, we believe that mirror bacteria and other mirror organisms, even those with engineered biocontainment measures, should not be created,” the authors write in Science.
“We therefore recommend that research with the goal of creating mirror bacteria not be permitted, and that funders make clear that they will not support such work.”
World-leading scientists have called for a halt on research to create “mirror life” microbes amid concerns that the synthetic organisms would present an “unprecedented risk” to life on Earth.
I'm not saying the scientists involved are idiots, but the reporting on this seems to be ban now and ask questions later.