Synthetic Biology/Economics
Workshop
Berkeley, CA. -
New “Gene Synthesis” Technologies let engineers create DNA molecules from scratch. Today, it is possible to write down an arbitrary genetic sequence, e-mail it to a commercial company, and obtain working DNA by return mail. For now, most sequences are taken from Nature with only minimal modification. However, engineers are pursuing a far more ambitious vision in which designer organisms can be created from a library of standard parts. The MIT “Biobricks” parts registry already contains more than one thousand parts.
Standard parts are ubiquitous in the digital economy, where engineers routinely assemble simple modules into complex devices ranging from microprocessor chips to business software. Standards have also been the driving force behind such striking “New Economy” phenomena as Microsoft’s monopoly and (more hopefully) the emergence of Open Source. During the 1990s, economists developed an elegant set of empirical and theoretical tools to understand these phenomena.
The question now is how standard parts will change biology. Questions include:
- Can synthetic biology avoid domination by a single, Microsoft like entity?
- Can synthetic biology develop communities around the use of open technologies?
- What IP system will deliver synthetic biology’s benefits to the most human beings over the next fifty years?
On
The Workshop concluded that IP policy is a potentially powerful lever for “tipping” synthetic biology to a LINUX-like solution in which basic modules are freely available to everyone. At the same time, companies may donate more (and more ambitious) parts if they are allowed to retain at least some IP rights for a limited period of time. Full details can be found in the Workshop Report.
