Today’s plenary lunch session was the most interesting of the sessions so far. Dr. Drew Endy, Assistant Professor at the Bioengeneering department at Stanford and the President of the BioBricks Foundation (a registry for DNA code), spoke about synthetic biology. His vision for the technology (which is well underway, by the way) is that there will be a large registry, sort of like iTunes, where one can download DNA sequences. Using an assembler, they can produce the DNA, and essentially write a computer program (organic machine) using DNA. Apparently, they have already mapped the DNA for all boolean algebra.

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I am sitting throught the third session in which the speaker claims to have solved the “food vs. fuel debate”. This particular company produces a biproduct which currently has no industrial use but it can be fed to cows. Therefore, the food vs. fuel problem is solved, right? Well he later mentioned that they are developing a way to turn the biproduct into ethanol.
Nice try. It’s just more PR - Predictable Rhetoric.

I heard a new term today in a discussion with a genetic engineer at my lunch table. “Cisgenic” is the introduction of a trait from the same species into its DNA. They use a different term because one of the criticisms of genetic engineering is that traits are introduced from organisms in a different kingdom, which makes some people uncomfortable. This new distinction, some industry players hope, will reduce public opposition to genetic engineering. Too bad cisgenic organisms still carry almost all the same risks. As Jefferey Smith pointed out, there is a ripple effect in the DNA of the host organism when a trait is inserted which effects the entire genome. Unrelated genes can mutate, make extra copies of themselves, change their levels of expression, and/or randomly turn on or off.

When I posed this to the man I was speaking to, he said that it is simply not economically feasable to see what other impact the insertion might have on the genome. In fact, for good measure, they will put in multiple copies of the trait they want to see expressed, because they have no idea how to ensure it works. Essentially, we just don’t know enough about genetic engineering to be playing around with gene insertions at this point.

When I posed that point, he agreed, but said that there is a cost-benefit analysis as to whether it is worth it because we can grow fuel instead of sucking it out of the ground. Too bad the people who accept the risk are not the people who receive the benefit.

Yesterday two speakers made arguments for biofuels projects. One said that there are good and bad biofuels projects. That is difficult to argue with, especially when using a fallen tree on your yard to heat you home, or burning waste veg oil in a diesel engine are considered biofuel projects. The other speaker outlined for criteria for evaluating biofuel projects, which are as follows:
1. No displacement of food crops
2. No conversion of undeveloped land
3. No errosion, runoff, or NOx emissions
4. All GHG emissions assessed on full lifecycle
These guidelines are very well thought out, and would be good for determining the environmental sustainability of any given project.
The problem is that the projects these two gentlemen were promoting did not meet the criteria. In fact, I believe that the criteria statement is purely PR. The biofuels industry has a PR problem.

The highlight of the first session was Christina Drake. Her title is Sr. Research Engineer with Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control, and her role is to integrate nanotechnology and biotechnology into LH research.
My favourite quote was “biotechnology is just chemistry.” Of course anyone who has done any research into the issues of generic engineering has realized by now that a fundamental problem is that the scientists are viewing plants and bacteria as machines rather than living organisms which are part of greater system.

As an attendee at this event, I will be covering many of the sessions on generic engineering, biofuels, nanotechnology, and synthetic biology.
As best as I can, I will be posting short snippets via my iPhone, and then I will do a more in depth report at the end of the conference.
Stay tuned.

Photo credit: Erin Collins

Alfalfa. Tasty sprouts. Hay. Straw. So much goodness. Thankfully, the US court of appeals upheld the ban on GE alfalfa, requiring more studies to be done on the environmental impacts. To celebrate, I’m going to go make myself a sandwich.

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I haven’t spent much time discussing alternatives to petrolium on this blog, but it is an issue that I think is very important. I personally drive a car that runs on waste vegetable oil, or WVO, and I will write more about that technology at a later time.
Yesterday I drove a friend’s Toyota Prius, and the experience was quite different then any other car I have driven. I usually try to conserve fuel as much as possible, but driving a hybrid really changes how you think about driving. The highly graphical display shows you when the car is running on gas and when it is running on electricity, and it also gives you your fuel economy. All the feedback makes the driver highly motivated to conserve fuel.
While I think that hybrid technology is a great way to reduce consumption, I can’t help wondering if the graphics and feedback on fuel consumpion would increase the fuel economy of any vehicle. Perhaps non Prius drivers could get into hypermiling too.

Zoom throws in the towel: http://www.flyzoom.com/

While the death of Zoom Airlines, a discount long-haul carrier based in the UK, is a tragedy for their 600 employees, it is a sign of changing times. I flew Vancouver to London on Zoom just three months ago, and it cost me $700, taxes in. That is $300 less than my most recent flight from Vancouver to Halifax, which is less than half the distance. Even at that price, the flight was only about 2/3rds full. I remember thinking at the time how economically unsustainable it was.

I think that there must be two underlying causes of the declining demand for cheap flights. First of all, with the global economic downturn sparked by the US housing crisis, fewer people who would otherwise be choosing an airline based on price are taking vacations. I think the second cause, which to me is more exciting, is that more people might be choosing to avoid flying because of the environmental repercussions.