A major challenge is to create generic platforms for synthetic biology. These will improve the accessibility of the technology, especially in the developing world, and open the way to more repeatable experiments. Synthetic biology platforms could include artificial vesicles for catalysis of reactions and delivery of molecules,10‘Synthetic Biology: Bottom-Up Assembly of Molecular Systems’Chemical Reviews, Vol. 122, p.16294. programmable systems for glueing proteins,11‘Protein Splicing of Inteins: A Powerful Tool in Synthetic Biology’Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology, Vol. 10. and micro-organisms with minimal genomes that are more readily reprogrammed and rationally designed.12‘Bacterial genome reduction for optimal chassis of synthetic biology: a review’Critical Reviews in Biotechnology, Vol. 44, p.660. Ecosystems of synthetic organisms also have potential but are under-explored.13‘Construction of Environmental Synthetic Microbial Consortia: Based on Engineering and Ecological Principles’Frontiers in Microbiology, Vol. 13.
In order to achieve the desired goals quickly and effectively, there is a need to develop new methods of designing synthetic organisms. Multiple avenues are being explored: some focus on designing organisms that exhibit goal-seeking and problem-solving behaviours,14‘Endless forms most beautiful 2.0: teleonomy and the bioengineering of chimaeric and synthetic organisms’Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, Vol. 139, p.457. while others are aiming for an open-ended evolutionary process that will continue to develop and change.15‘Open-endedness in synthetic biology: A route to continual innovation for biological design’Science Advances, Vol. 10.
The opportunities of synthetic biology come with risk. Engineered organisms have considerable potential to harm humans and ecosystems intentionally or accidentally. Hence some synthetic biologists are devising ways to contain their engineered organisms:16‘Ecological firewalls for synthetic biology’iScience, Vol. 25, p.104658. for instance, ensuring organisms can survive only when given a specific chemical that is not found in nature.17‘Engineering stringent genetic biocontainment of yeast with a protein stability switch’Nature Communications, Vol. 15, p.1060. The best strategies will use multiple orthogonal control systems, providing several fail-safes to minimise the chances of escape.18‘Intrinsic biocontainment: Multiplex genome safeguards combine transcriptional and recombinational control of essential yeast genes’PNAS, Vol. 112, p.1803.
The Anticipation Potential of a research field is determined by the capacity for impactful action in the present, considering possible future transformative breakthroughs in a field over a 25-year outlook. A field with a high Anticipation Potential, therefore, combines the potential range of future transformative possibilities engendered by a research area with a wide field of opportunities for action in the present. We asked researchers in the field to anticipate:
This chart represents a summary of their responses to each of these elements, which when combined, provide the Anticipation Potential for the topic. See methodology for more information.
