by Andrew Maynard | Jul 8, 2009 | Nanotechnology, Oversight
I’m often intrigued by the evolution of an article from its early drafts to the final version. To complement today’s commentary on nanotechnology regulation in the journal Nature, written jointly with David Rejeski, I thought it would be interesting to post an early...
by Andrew Maynard | Mar 26, 2009 | Nanotechnology, Oversight
I’m looking at an electron microscope image of a carbon nanotube – as I cannot show it here, you’ll have to imagine it. It shows a long, straight, multi-walled carbon nanotube, around 100 nanometers wide and 10 micrometers long. There is nothing...
by Andrew Maynard | Mar 25, 2009 | Communication, Oversight, Policy, Synthetic Biology
A five-minute primer on the promise and challenge of first-generation synthetic biology As an addendum to the previous post on synthetic biology, the following interview from the Wilson Center provides a great overview of what synthetic biology is all about, and the...
by Andrew Maynard | Mar 25, 2009 | Oversight, Policy, Recommended, Synthetic Biology
A new report looks at the challenges of regulating first generation products of synthetic biology. At the J. Craig Venter Institute, scientists are on the verge of creating a living organism from “dead” chemicals, by rebooting a microbe with a new—and completely...
by Andrew Maynard | Dec 26, 2008 | Oversight, Synthetic Biology
Last June I wrote a short piece on biohacking, prompted by a UK report on the social and ethical challenges of synthetic biology. At the time, I though the aspirations of the nascent biopunk community naively optimistic, but potentially worrying. Six months on,...
