US President Orders Review of Implications of Synthetic Biological Research. (May 22, 2010)

With the publication in yesterday's journal Science of the multiple rounds of reproduction of a synthetically manufactured one-million-base-pair genome copy of Mycoplasma  mycoides by a cell of M capricolum which was devoid of its original DNA, the White House has written to the Chair of  the the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues "requesting" that the commission undertake "a study of the implications of this scientific milestone, as well as other advances that may lie ahead in this field of research".

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[See also: http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2010/05/synthetic-biology-answers.html]