Genome engineering
The nuclease only makes a break — the cell's repair machinery decides what the edit becomes; writing genomes runs into what nobody understands; containment is a rate and a procedure, not a feature.
Twelve subjects that descend from one sentence: the nuclease only makes a break — what the edit becomes is decided by the cell’s repair machinery. The newer editors are variations on escaping that dependence, each buying precision at its own price: base editing works on a displaced strand and edits a wider window than you asked for; prime editing carries its own template and puts the whole engineering problem into guide design; epigenome editing changes whether a gene is read without touching what it says, and must answer whether the change lasts.
The second idea: writing genomes runs into what nobody yet understands. A bacterium reduced to 473 genes still contains dozens whose function is unknown — and that is the result, not a footnote. A circuit that worked on its own stops working inside a cell, and the synthetic-biology page counts the reasons.
The third: containment and biosecurity are rates and procedures, not features. A genetic kill switch is a rate set by how many mutants a population can afford; a gene drive breeds its own resistance allele each time it fails; DNA-synthesis screening works exactly as well as sequence similarity does.
Start with genome editing — every other page here modifies its central sentence.
Articles 12
| Xenobiology & expanded genetic alphabet Building genetics that the rest of the biosphere cannot read — and the several distinct chemistries that get there. |
| Base editing Chemistry on a single displaced DNA strand — no break, no template, and a window that edits more than you asked for. |
| Biosafety and laboratory biosecurity Containment is airflow, pressure and filtration doing arithmetic — and at the highest level it fails on procedure, not on engineering. |
| CRISPR screening as a service A pooled screen is a statistical experiment whose answer is decided before any biology happens — by coverage, infection rate and the choice of selection. |
| DNA synthesis biosecurity screening Screening an order against a list of dangerous sequences works exactly as well as sequence similarity does — and there are three ways around it. |
| Ecological engineering and gene drives Inheritance biased above one half — and the resistance allele the mechanism generates every time it fails. |
| Epigenome editing Changing whether a gene is read without changing what it says — and the one question that decides whether the change lasts. |
| Genome editing The nuclease only makes a break. What the edit becomes is decided by the cell's repair machinery. |
| Intelligent genetic switches and kill switches Containment is not a feature but a rate — and the rate is set by how many mutants the population can afford to make. |
| Minimal genomes and synthetic cells A bacterium reduced to 473 genes still contains scores whose function nobody knows — and that is the result, not a footnote. |
| Prime editing A reverse transcriptase writing new DNA from a template carried by the guide itself — and why the guide design is the whole engineering problem. |
| Synthetic biology The attempt to make biology composable — and the four reasons a circuit that worked on its own stops working inside a cell. |