1. BIOTECHNOLOGY:
APPLICATIONS OF
MICROBIAL GENETICS
โข Biotechnology: The use of microorganisms,
cells, or cell components to make a product
โข Foods, antibiotics, vitamins, enzymes
โข Recombinant DNA technology: Insertion
or modi๏ฌcation of genes to produce
desired proteins.
Monday, February 27, 2012
2. BIOTECHNOLOGY:
APPLICATIONS OF
MICROBIAL GENETICS
Monday, February 27, 2012
3. BIOTECHNOLOGY:
APPLICATIONS OF
MICROBIAL GENETICS
Monday, February 27, 2012
4. BENEFITS FROM
BIOTECHNOLOGY
Monday, February 27, 2012
5. BENEFITS FROM
BIOTECHNOLOGY
Monday, February 27, 2012
6. BENEFITS FROM
BIOTECHNOLOGY
Monday, February 27, 2012
8. Biological Research has led to the development of
new drugs, treatments, and medical
advancements that have profoundly impacted our
health and way of life
The General Public holds
scientists and their work
in high regard and trusts
that they will act in the
best interest of society
Monday, February 27, 2012
9. โLegitimate scienti๏ฌc work that could be misused to
threaten public health or national securityโ
What is
Dual-Use
Research?
Monday, February 27, 2012
11. THUS: any medical advance that
improves the ease of engineering,
handling, or delivering treatment has the
potential to be applied by those wishing
to do harm and can be considered "dual-
use
Monday, February 27, 2012
12. โadvances in biotechnology โฆ have the potential to create a much more dangerous
biological warfare threat โฆ engineered biological agents could be worse than any disease
known to man.โ (CIA, 2003)
Monday, February 27, 2012
13. โadvances in biotechnology โฆ have the potential to create a much more dangerous
biological warfare threat โฆ engineered biological agents could be worse than any disease
known to man.โ (CIA, 2003)
Monday, February 27, 2012
15. โ Dr. Wimmer, Distinguished Professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology at the State
University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook
โ 1991: Published the chemical formula of the polio virus
โ 2001:biochemically synthesized (deliberately) poliovirus according to its genomic sequence in the
absence of a template without a DNA or RNA template, or the help of living cells
โ 2002 published in Science
โ DUAL USE Implications: unnecessarily demonstrating how bioterrorists could use modern scientific
techniques to create dangerous pathogens
โ POLICY: โprior to attempting synthesis of a microbial chromosome we commissioned an independent
bioethical review of our proposed scientific plan.โ
Monday, February 27, 2012
16. โ Dr. Wimmer, Distinguished Professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology at the State
University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook
โ 1991: Published the chemical formula of the polio virus
โ 2001:biochemically synthesized (deliberately) poliovirus according to its genomic sequence in the
absence of a template without a DNA or RNA template, or the help of living cells
โ 2002 published in Science
โ DUAL USE Implications: unnecessarily demonstrating how bioterrorists could use modern scientific
techniques to create dangerous pathogens
โ POLICY: โprior to attempting synthesis of a microbial chromosome we commissioned an independent
bioethical review of our proposed scientific plan.โ
Monday, February 27, 2012
20. โ Dr. Stuart Levy of the Tufts University School of Medicine (Antimicrobial
Agents and Chemotherapy, 2006) identified a gene in Yersinia pestis similar
to an Escherichia coli gene known to cause multiple antibiotic resistance
โ Yesinia pestis causes plague, famously known as the โBlack Deathโ after
it caused an estimated 50 million deaths throughout Europe, Africa, and
Asia in the 1300โs.
โ confers resistance to a variety of drugs, oxidative stress agents, and
organic solvents
โ transcriptional regulators of a multidrug efflux pump
โ MarR protein represses transcription of the efflux pump, whereas the MarA
protein increases its expression, thereby activating antibiotic resistance.
Monday, February 27, 2012
22. โ In his 1945 Nobel
Prize lecture,
Fleming ended
with a cautionary
remark saying;
โbut I would like
to sound one
note of
warningโฆ it is
not difficult to
make microbes
resistant to
penicillin in the
laboratory by
exposing them to
concentrations
not sufficient to
kill them, and the
same thing has
occasionally
happened in the
body.โ
Monday, February 27, 2012
25. โ PROS: experiments could uncover the reasons why the Spanish flu pandemic
was so deadly and could offer insight into avian flu pathology and how it might
become transmissible in humans.
โ CONS:
โ publication of the viral sequence, conditions under which the virus was
handled and the threat of its escape into the environment;
โ recreate deadly and transmissible though extinct or eradicated viruses;
โ can be used for the design of a weapon of mass destruction; there is a risk
verging on inevitability of accidentalโฆ or deliberate release of the virus.
โ IMPACT TO PUBLIC HEALTH: advancement in tools to sequence genomes
and synthesize DNA; BUT could be used to engineer biological weapons
Monday, February 27, 2012
26. โare there potential benefits
to public health and safety
from application or utilization
of this information?โ
We must PREVENT such MISUSE
without IMPEDING research
PROGRESS!
Monday, February 27, 2012
