dressing biosafety and biosecurity concerns.
Furthermore, the advent and expansion of the community laboratory model is influencing the discussion of biosafety and biosecurity in part because an individual operating in his or her home faces different issues and potential risks than someone working in an organized lab space. Community labs also serve as meeting places to discuss these issues and provide courses and hands-on experience. (Read more about the flourishing of community laboratories in “Biology Hacklabs.”)
So, flashy headlines and naive criticism aside, how serious a threat is the DIYbio community really? We should remember that the one terrorist attack using a biological agent in the United States—the 2001 anthrax letters—was carried out by an employee of a national laboratory with all of the security afforded to it by the US government. It was not carried out by a DIY biologist working at home or in a community lab. In fact, those wishing to cause harm would find it difficult to operate in an environment as open and transparent as the DIYbio community.
Citizen scientists are dedicated to education, innovation, and problem solving, using a new model in the human spirit of curiosity and exploration. Community laboratories are also beginning to change the way we educate our children. Genspace serves as a node for the Urban Barcoding Project, which provides extramural learning opportunities for New York City schoolchildren, grades K–12. (See “Barcode High,” The Scientist, December 2011.) Projects like this are exciting the next generation of scientists, engineers, and innovators in ways that traditional curricula cannot. Whether or not the movement produces scientific breakthroughs or technological innovations is still an open question, but no one would have predicted that a few friends tinkering with computers in their garage would produce one of the wealthiest companies that ever existed.
The citizen-science movement is rapidly expanding, and some would argue that it cannot be stopped. There is no evidence to suggest that these efforts pose undue risk to society, and the DIYbio community holds the potential to improve science education in the U.S., which was ranked 25th in math and 17th in science worldwide in a 2012 report from Harvard University’s Program on Education Policy and Governance. Public policy should be written to enable the exploration and innovation of the DIYbio community—not to limit its reach based on overblown fears of the unknown.
Todd Kuiken is a senior research associate in the Science and Technology Innovation Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars where he focuses on biosafety and biosecurity aspects of synthetic biology.