Regenesis: Exploring the Possibilities of Synthetic Biology and Its Impact on Nature and Humanity

garcía: It’s a fascinating topic, and the only book in synthetic biology that I am aware of. The first author is a first character in that area, a singular and fascinating biologist, and therefore he tells the story with profound knowledge. However, I found the writing disappointing. Long paragraphs or pages hard to understand, boring, unnecessarily concrete, and with little substance to take home. Also, I often missed diagrams to fully understand.

Spain on Jun 19, 2023

Navansh: Awesome and in very good condition

India on Nov 13, 2021

Ben: A fascinating book from a genius scientist whose incredible breadth of work has made - and will continue to make - major contributions towards solutions to humanity's greatest challenges.

Australia on Feb 25, 2021

davide: Non ho ancora finito di leggerlo ma già lo recensisco come uno dei libri più chiari e pieni di idee su genomica e biotecnologie in rapporto al futuro dell'umanità che ho letto negli ultimi anni.
Consigliato anche per i neofiti nel campo della genetica, anche se in alcune pagine (ma poche) può risultare molto tecnico.

Scoperto grazie ad "Estinzione" Di James Rollings!

Italy on Feb 09, 2016

E: When I saw that George Church - known for the genetic "killswitch", the 3D structure of the ribosome and much more - had written a book, I ordered it the next day. When it arrived, I was anything but disappointed.

True to reputation, Church takes his readers on a journey through existing technologies and possibilities many of us would never dream of. Think carpets manufactured by bacteria, Eco-friendly bioplastics, seed-grown houses, bringing extinct species back to life, induced viral immunity, DNA cryptography, and turning your compost or toilet into a power plant. He presents the living organism as a programmable machine much like a computer - a thrilling and horrifying idea all at once.

Although I am quite familiar with molecular biology, one does not need to be to read Regenesis.To those without a background in biology, the book may be a bit dense, but it is perfectly accessible. For example, in order to explain how one would actually go about inducing immunity to all viruses (reversing an entire organism's stereochemistry), Church explains what stereochemistry is, why it is important, and how (by altering an organism's genetic code) we could bring about a...

Canada on May 10, 2015

R. Bloom: A bit of a dense book (which is why I gave it only 4 stars). But if you read it through, a world will open for you. The book is about synthetic genetics -- how the advances that are happening right now, but especially in the decades to come, will change the world and blow your mind.
There is a lot in this book. But I would like to just talk about my favorite part -- the iGEM competition. iGEM is an international student competition for genetic engineering. As Church says [referring to the year 2005], "Undergrads were now doing things, largely in a spirit of fun, that professional molecular biologists would have been hard-pressed to achieve a mere ten years earlier."
In the 2007 competition, the team from UC Berkeley engineered E. coli to produce a blood substitute that could be freeze-dried and stored, and then could be reconstituted and grown up in large volumes when needed. In 2008, the grand prize winner was a Slovenian team from the University of Ljubljana which created a synthetic vaccine for the bacteria that causes stomach ulcers. In 2006, the same Slovenian team had presented an idea for preventing infection of human cells by HIV.
In 2010 the competition had grown...

United States on Feb 09, 2013

A. D. Thibeault: *A full executive summary of this book is available here:  An Executive Summary of George M. Church and Ed Regis's 'Regenesis: How Synthetic Biology Will Reinvent Nature and Ourselves'

DNA was only discovered about a century ago, and its structure remained a mystery until about half a century ago, but since this time our knowledge and understanding of DNA has grown immensely (indeed exponentially). What's more, this understanding has evolved to include not just an understanding of how DNA works, but also how it can be manipulated to help advance our ends. The most glaring example here is the phenomenon of genetically modified food. Though not without controversy initially (and some fringe opposition that lives on to this day), it is fair to say that genetically modified food was one of the major scientific advances of the 20th century. Over and above this, our understanding of DNA appeared to reach its most impressive manifestation with the successful sequencing of the human genome in the year 2000.

For the genetics professor and pioneering genetic engineer George Church, however, genetically modified food and the Human Genome Project are but the tip of the...

United States on Oct 19, 2012