Decoding human genome: Scientists creating yeast DNA from scratch

New Delhi: Scientists say they are building yeast DNA from scratch, paving the way towards creating new organisms in the lab, amid huge scientific hurdles and public scrutiny. 

The initiative being discussed at the New York City meeting in May - Genome Project-write (GP-write) - has been surrounded by worries over creating unnatural beings in the labs.

For the notable project, the group of researchers aim to synthesise from scratch all 23 chromosomes of the human genome and insert them into cells in the lab.

While scientists are yet to come to a conclusion on a specific road map for moving forward of the project, creating a human genome from scratch is a tremendous scientific and engineering challenge, which they believe will hinge on developing new methods for synthesizing and delivering DNA.

The GP-write consortium members believe that turning to human genome synthesis will also enable new cell therapies and other medical advances.

The overall project is still under development, and scientists are also unclear where funding will come from.

The synthetic genomes and chromosomes already constructed by scientists are by no means simple, but to synthesize the human genome, scientists will have to address a whole other level of complexity.

Our genome is composed of more than 3 billion bases across 23 paired chromosomes. And to synthesize the human genome could mean scientists will have to address a whole other level of complexity.

The GP-Write project is being managed by the Center of Excellence for Engineering Biology, a new non-profit organisation.