World-leading scientists have called for a halt on research to create “mirror life” microbes amid concerns that the synthetic organisms would present an “unprecedented risk” to life on Earth.
The international group of Nobel laureates and other experts warn that mirror bacteria, constructed from mirror images of molecules found in nature, could become established in the environment and slip past the immune defences of natural organisms, putting humans, animals and plants at risk of lethal infections.
Many molecules for life can exist in two distinct forms, each the mirror image of the other. The DNA of all living organisms is made from “right-handed” nucleotides, while proteins, the building blocks of cells, are made from “left-handed” amino acids. Why nature works this way is unclear: life could have chosen left-handed DNA and right-handed proteins instead.
The fresh concerns over the technology are revealed in a 299-page report and a commentary in the journal Science. While enthusiastic about research on mirror molecules, the report sees substantial risks in mirror microbes and calls for a global debate on the work.
And here I thought my late 2024 anxiety level was maxed out already.
It gets worse. They are also working on mirror physics, where they launch orbiting observatories made of antimatter. What could possibly go wrong.
Antimatter does not replicate the way microbes do to be fair. It’s dangerous to handle in large enough amounts obviously, be we don’t have the energy to produce enough to create a serious danger nor the technology to store that amount at once.
I love the movie Galaxy Quest.
It’s a ROCK! IT DOESN’T HAVE ANY VULNERABLE SPOTS!
Anyone feeling freaked out by this doesn’t have anything to worry about. There’s nothing you and I can do to stop the research. Go on and enjoy your life.
The thing about that is if all this is for is research then I could have some hope that they’d actually stop.
If someone thinks there’s profit to be made and that’s what is driving the research then it’s never going to stop unless they go bankrupt or it proves to be worthless… What happens to the world at large doesn’t matter one bit to people chasing profit :(
Ahh yes, man made horrors beyond our comprehension
Proteins and DNA and their mirrored counterparts behave like the Tetris L and ⅃ blocks, basically the same but you cannot rotate them to fit in a hole meant for the other. Fitting in holes is, somewhat literally, how most processes of life work on the sub-cellular level.
Processes like the immune system. And if an experimental microbe from mirrored DNA doesn’t fit in the holes your immune system uses to identify things, because all the proteins curve the wrong way, there’s no telling how it behaves, even if the unmirrored version is one of the most studied organisms. And it’s not just your immune system, it’s every living things’ one. And 1 microbe alone is a potential pandemic.
I am no expert, but I hope the horror is comprehensible now. If not, I imagine minuteEarth’s video on mirrored molecules is basically the same reasoning here, with the caveat that mirrored DNA tends to make more of itself.
The incomprehensible part was that we don’t know how bad things can get if this stuff got out into the wild. I got the chiral parts lol thanks for the further explanation
Sure. Why not. Add it to the pile.
Evil microbes with little goatees…
