Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[GiglameshDespair]

Believing a terrorism group would have the materials or ability to effect a genetic mutation required to culture and deliver fungal species as a weapon of mass destruction is based on a highly flawed false premise and displays a clear lack of understanding about microbiology.

B-but it happened in that film I watched, it has to be easy!

[wierd]

Insistence that it cannot happen (terrorist group bioengineering) based on 20 year old anectdotes exhibits a clear lack of understanding of where biotechnology currently sits as a modern appliance.

You can submit a complete 20k basepair sequencing job (as in, you send them a digital baispair file, and they send you complete neucleotide sequences. Not fragments, whole sequences) for about 20k us dollars.

They dont bother to screen what the sequences you asked for do. They just send them to you. 

The education required to do the rest of the work can be gained from 3rd year university.

Note, the price is going down every year. Not up.

In the 90s, you could only synthesize a few hundred neucleotides at a time, and had to join them laboriously inside a yeast model.  using 90s capabilities to foofoo what can be done on the cheap today displays a clear lack of understanding.




EDIT:  It's even cheaper than the last time I looked.  Looks like you could have an entire human genome synthesized for about 7k USD.

https://www.scienceexchange.com/services/whole-genome-seq?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Whole_Genome_Sequencing&utm_content=whole_genome_sequencing&utm_term=whole genome sequencing&creative=47112762110&keyword=whole genome sequencing&matchtype=e&network=g&device=c&url={escapedlpurl}&gclid=CPvU7Oem-8sCFY9hfgodUr4Jlg

That puts getting an engineered fungal genome well within a terror group's price point.

[Amperzand]

Wouldn't thermobaric bombing glass the ground?
I have no idea what a thermobaric bomb is but it sounds thermo.

AFAIK, thermobarics function by aerosolizing a high-energy fuel, then igniting it. They do produce a good amount of heat, but rather more notable, at least according to random places on the internet, is the unbelievably powerful shockwave generated by the detonation. A conventional bomb carrying the ten tons or so of TNT needed to equate to the mass of a superheavy thermobaric detonates with the force of, well, ten tons of TNT. The thermobaric bomb detonates with the force of more than a thousand. I'd recommend somebody with more time go do research on Wikipedia or something, but hey.

[Cryxis, Prince of Doom]

On thermoberrics, could an air burst bomb be used to knock down (a) sky scrapper(s)?

[Amperzand]

They're almost invariably airburst, since big ones need to be set off above ground level for best effect, AFAIK. And yes, you can definitely destroy skyscrapers with them, they can get up to kiloton yield.

[Culise]

Not agriculture so much as "put as many random plants into this area as possible, as quickly as possible".

Should probably be augmented with parachute-mounted saplings with their root-bulbs encased in damp compost, and any seeds dropped as paper bags filled with damp compost and a mixture of self-complementing seeds.

Are there any studies on how quickly animals and bugs and whatsuch would repopulate this hypothetical built-up area? It's an interesting idea at least.

I wonder, but I suppose volcanic islands could be a useful case study for life propagation in regions reduced to a truly abiotic state, which is likely an extreme case for this hypothetical.  Surtsey, for instance, formed from 1963-1964 by continuous eruptions.  Vascular plant life was first found in spring of 1965, though the island is still dominated by mosses which first became visible by 1967.  The first bush was found in 1998, and at least 70 species of vascular plants are now present on the island.  Insect life was discovered even before the eruptions finished in 1964; today, spiders, beetles, earthworms, and slugs have all become established on the island as well as smaller insects such as mites, springtails, flies, wasps, various lepidoptera, and the like.  Microfauna doesn't even bear consideration; like everywhere else, there's an uncountable amount of prokaryotic and eukaryotic life there today.  Birds and ocean currents (carrying detritus) both were key contributors to the spread of life to the isolated island, but even the wind was enough to carry flying insects to the island. 

[Tack]

Oh, so thermobarics is a fuel-air bomb.

[Parsely]

Not agriculture so much as "put as many random plants into this area as possible, as quickly as possible".

Should probably be augmented with parachute-mounted saplings with their root-bulbs encased in damp compost, and any seeds dropped as paper bags filled with damp compost and a mixture of self-complementing seeds.

Are there any studies on how quickly animals and bugs and whatsuch would repopulate this hypothetical built-up area? It's an interesting idea at least.

I wonder, but I suppose volcanic islands could be a useful case study for life propagation in regions reduced to a truly abiotic state, which is likely an extreme case for this hypothetical.  Surtsey, for instance, formed from 1963-1964 by continuous eruptions.  Vascular plant life was first found in spring of 1965, though the island is still dominated by mosses which first became visible by 1967.  The first bush was found in 1998, and at least 70 species of vascular plants are now present on the island.  Insect life was discovered even before the eruptions finished in 1964; today, spiders, beetles, earthworms, and slugs have all become established on the island as well as smaller insects such as mites, springtails, flies, wasps, various lepidoptera, and the like.  Microfauna doesn't even bear consideration; like everywhere else, there's an uncountable amount of prokaryotic and eukaryotic life there today.  Birds and ocean currents (carrying detritus) both were key contributors to the spread of life to the isolated island, but even the wind was enough to carry flying insects to the island.

This is the kind of thing I was looking for. Very interesting.

[Amperzand]

Oh, so thermobarics is a fuel-air bomb.

Yes, sorry, should have clarified that. :V

[Tack]

Shouldn't need to layman it for us plebs.

[Jimmy]

Insistence that it cannot happen (terrorist group bioengineering) based on 20 year old anectdotes exhibits a clear lack of understanding of where biotechnology currently sits as a modern appliance.

You can submit a complete 20k basepair sequencing job (as in, you send them a digital baispair file, and they send you complete neucleotide sequences. Not fragments, whole sequences) for about 20k us dollars.

They dont bother to screen what the sequences you asked for do. They just send them to you. 

The education required to do the rest of the work can be gained from 3rd year university.

Note, the price is going down every year. Not up.

In the 90s, you could only synthesize a few hundred neucleotides at a time, and had to join them laboriously inside a yeast model.  using 90s capabilities to foofoo what can be done on the cheap today displays a clear lack of understanding.




EDIT:  It's even cheaper than the last time I looked.  Looks like you could have an entire human genome synthesized for about 7k USD.

https://www.scienceexchange.com/services/whole-genome-seq?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Whole_Genome_Sequencing&utm_content=whole_genome_sequencing&utm_term=whole genome sequencing&creative=47112762110&keyword=whole genome sequencing&matchtype=e&network=g&device=c&url={escapedlpurl}&gclid=CPvU7Oem-8sCFY9hfgodUr4Jlg

That puts getting an engineered fungal genome well within a terror group's price point.

Perhaps you might want to brush up on your scientific terminology, because the information you've quoted is for genome sequencing. All that means is that I can take a cheek swab from my auntie Ethel and get her genetic code analysed to figure out why she has poor liver enzyme function. That does nothing to alter my aunt's genetic code to transform her into a mutant killer.

You should instead look at genome editing, which is the process of inserting new genetic code to express new features inside an organism. Genetically modified organisms have been around since the early 70's. Despite this, it's only two years ago that anyone has been able to successfully add artificial genetic code to a viable organism, and even then, only one DNA base pair was added.

Commercial modification of plant structures is big business, and both heavily regulated as well as well funded. Modified seeds, controlled by patent and sold under license, account for 82% of the world's seed market. 38% of these come from 2 US companies, Mosanto (23%) and DuPont (15%). The companies which manufacture and produce these plants hold numerous patents on both the genes used to manufacture them and the tools and processes used to produce them. You've likely eaten something grown by them in the last week.

And yet, despite this technology being available, there's no incentive to use it for terrorism. First, it's completely too complicated logistically to consider as a viable weapon. It would likely take decades to develop a strain lethal enough to cause serious harm, and that's assuming you can even gather the expertise and materials to manufacture one and successfully test it. The tools to do this are concentrated in an incredibly small number of companies, all of whom have built a business model around denying their competitors access to their techniques. Second, the method isn't even guaranteed to work. Why would you spend years cultivating a nasty strain of fungus when you could have produced an order of magnitude higher amount of simple chemical neurotoxin in the same time? It's far simpler to produce and guaranteed to give you bang for your buck.

[wierd]

that is patently false.  Jellyfish protien is used everywhere as an expression marker, and has been used as such for over a decade.  You are probably referring to whole genome synthesis, with the creation of the first wholly synthetic genome some 6 years ago. (not two. link:  www.nytimes.com/2010/05/21/science/21cell.html?_r=0 ) it was for a bacterium, done by venter institute.  Novel genomes are made in university settings quite regularly these days. I can hardly turn around without stumbling over new papers describing novel mechanisms for getting bacteria to respond to synthetic environmental chemical signals for a wide variety of purposes. Amusingly, that is exactly what Dr Venter created his synthetic minimalist bacterial genome(s) (he has more than one now.) for-- accellerating research of this nature.

Besides, your quibble about sequencing vs synthesis is still silly. You can get both done as a service.

www.biomatik.com/services/gene-synthesis-gene-synthesis/gene-synthesis.html

It costs between 18 and 12 cents per base pair. We can round that to a nice even 20 cents, and have a 20kbase sequence synthesized for just a few grand.  This is completely discounting that you really dont need a whole genome synthesized, you just need the novel genes you want, and then to incorporate them in your target reference species. That's where CRISPR/CAS comes in. Very precise gene insertion with that new technique.


As for motive-- I have already covered that. The 3 scenarios I mentioned have persistent threat as a plus, which a one off neurotoxin batch does not provide. In those scenarios, a pathogen running amok is considered a "plus." 

[Amperzand]

Notably, said genome still does not reside in an organism able to make use of it, which I believe is what Jimmy was saying.

[wierd]

No, the produced baterium was fully able to reproduce. Thats why it got a press release.

Obligatory wikipedia on the microbe in question.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycoplasma_laboratorium


Dr Venter has been a very prolific researcher in the realm of wholly synthetic genomes. His recent work has focused on hyper-minimal, but fully functional bacterial genomes.

www.jcvi.org/cms/press/press-releases/full-text/article/first-minimal-synthetic-bacterial-cell-designed-and-constructed-by-scientists-at-venter-institute-an/

He has a small selection of synthetic bacteria now.

[Jimmy]

Venter didn't create anything new, all he did was prove the possibility of creating existing DNA artificially. It's an impressive feat for Venter to create a DNA chain in vitro and insert this chain into a viable self replicating organism, but it doesn't alter the fact that it failed to produce any significant change in the basic DNA of the organism, instead simply acting as an artificial carbon copy of the original mycoplasma genitalium. If you'd bothered reading the second page of the 2014 report, you'd have noted that it specifically addresses the difference between the 2010 Venter microbe and the 2014 Scripps achievement. Scripps was the first to be able to successfully insert a completely new, artificially created DNA base pair and have it propagated in successive generations. But even despite this, the base pair was completely unable to express any form of protein and thus had no significant effect on the microbe's biological function, and their method deliberately sabotaged the ability of the altered microbe to reproduce by utilizing a method that requires the non-standard artificial base pair be synthesized using triphosphate compounds that must be supplied in the laboratory, meaning it will die in the wild. Hardly useful to copy their methodology to create a unique virulent plague strain.

In two of your three scenarios (misanthropy and psychopathy) these would both suggest a single individual acting alone to manufacture this compound. Simply put, this is pure fantasy to believe one person could create a complex bioterrorism weapon on their own. They'd be much more likely to utilize a simple style of attack, such as Ted Kaczynski or Timothy McVeigh. Doomsday cultists such as the real life Aum Shinrikyo example or similar religious terrorists might aspire to creating a form of biological weapon, but it's ludicrous to believe they'd manage to succeed in artificially creating a pathogenic fungal strain via mail order.

If this theoretical bioterrorism organisation seriously wanted to utilize a self-propagating strain of contagious pathogen, I really don't understand why they're spending all cash and effort to synthesize an artificial fungus when there's plenty of other good options. Hell, Ebola's nice and lethal, and since 2013 there's plenty of it around for the taking in West Africa, even today. Everyone knows that the major nations likely already have GMO strains of super-Ebola anyhow, primarily because it's so darned good at what it does.