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Applications and ethics of computer-designed organisms

Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology volume 21, pages 655–656 (2020)Cite this article

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Computer-designed organisms — biobots, such as xenobots — are at the intersection of synthetic developmental biology and machine learning. This technology, which enables the evolution of real, living forms to take place in a virtual world, is part of an emerging new research field with applications in biomedicine and engineering, and raises profound philosophical questions.

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Acknowledgements

M.L. gratefully acknowledges support (via grant TWCF0315) from the Templeton World Charity Foundation and from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) under Cooperative Agreement Number HR0011-18-2-0022. J.E.L. is supported by a grant from the Greenwall Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Allen Discovery Center at Tufts University, Medford, MA, USA

    M. Levin

  2. Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, Harvard University, Boston, MA, USA

    M. Levin & J. E. Lunshof

  3. Department of Computer Science, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT, USA

    J. Bongard

  4. Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard Center for Bioethics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    J. E. Lunshof

  5. Department of Genetics, University Medical Center Groningen, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands

    J. E. Lunshof

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  1. M. Levin
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  2. J. Bongard
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  3. J. E. Lunshof
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Correspondence to M. Levin.

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Levin, M., Bongard, J. & Lunshof, J.E. Applications and ethics of computer-designed organisms. Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol 21, 655–656 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41580-020-00284-z

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