Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Category: bioengineering – Page 173

In 2017, synthetic biology companies raised a record amount of funding – just over $1.8 billion for fifty two companies – driven mostly by several multi-hundred million dollar deals. This was a 50% increase over the previous year, a pace of growth that indicated an intense interest in the field from outside investors. It seems that this interest has only intensified since then, as 27 companies raised $650 million in funding during the first quarter of 2018, which is double the activity of the first quarter of 2017. At this rate, the field is on track to raise over $2.4 billion with over 100 companies being funded, which would be a record for both statistics.

Synthetic Biology Companies Funding

The companies raising money in 2018 are pursuing a broadly diverse set of applications from all sections of the synthetic biology technology stack. Many companies are developing products that will eventually end up in the hands (or bodies) of everyday consumers, but others are making the tools and reagents that will empower the whole field to become more productive. It is important that all of these types of companies exist in order to build a healthy industry ecosystem.

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Advocates of transhumanism face a similar choice today. One option is to take advantage of the advances in nanotechnologies, genetic engineering and other medical sciences to enhance the biological and mental functioning of human beings (never to go back). The other is to legislate to prevent these artificial changes from becoming an entrenched part of humanity, with all the implied coercive bio-medicine that would entail for the species.

We can either take advantage of advances in technology to enhance human beings (never to go back), or we can legislate to prevent this from happening.

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A new study has posited the idea that microbial life could exist in Venus’s clouds.

In a new study, scientists are exploring the idea that life could be lurking high up in the clouds of Venus, and suggest that the planet’s atmosphere would be the perfect place to begin a search for microbial life.

Scientist Sanjay Limaye, who works at the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Space Science and Engineering Center, conducted the latest research with a group of international researchers and noted that it is highly possible that Venus may have once had a plentiful supply of liquid water on the planet’s surface that could have been in existence for at least 2 billion years, according to Phys. Org.

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Scientists are increasingly betting their time and effort that the way to control the world is through proteins. Proteins are what makes life animated. They take information encoded in DNA and turn it into intricate three-dimensional structures, many of which act as tiny machines. Proteins work to ferry oxygen through the bloodstream, extract energy from food, fire neurons, and attack invaders. One can think of DNA as working in the service of the proteins, carrying the information on how, when and in what quantities to make them.

Living things make thousands of different proteins, but soon there could be many more, as scientists are starting to learn to design new ones from scratch with specific purposes in mind. Some are looking to design new proteins for drugs and vaccines, while others are seeking cleaner catalysts for the chemical industry and new materials.

David Baker, director for the Institute for Protein Design at the University of Washington, compares protein design to the advent of custom tool-making. At some point, proto-humans went beyond merely finding uses for pieces of wood, rock or bone, and started designing tools to suit specific needs — from screwdrivers to sports cars.

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For the first time in history, researchers have fused artificial cells with biological cells in a way that lets them work together. This opens the door for a variety of new possibilities and applications.

Fusing biological and artificial cells

The research team at Imperial College London uses a system that encapsulates biological cells within an artificial cell. Using this approach, the team can harness the ability of biological cells to produce chemicals while offering them protection from the environment.

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