Biohacking
Download as PPTX, PDF1 like409 views
This document discusses the history and future of biohacking, which combines genetic engineering and human performance enhancement. It describes current techniques like using RFID chips or chlorophyll drops and projects to enhance traits like intelligence. The future may see engineered longevity, higher human intelligence through gene editing, and "designer babies." The role of hackerspaces is to educate, push boundaries safely, and start grassroots biotech businesses pursuing goals beyond corporate interests like agriculture. Overall it presents biohacking as a way to actively shape human evolution and potential through technology.
Biohacking
- 2. Agenda ▪ Two historical roots ▪ Human performance enhancement ▪ Genetic engineering ▪ The two are meeting today ▪ Futures ▪ Longevity ▪ Human intelligence enhancement ▪ Designer babies ▪ The role of the hackerspace
- 3. Human Performance Enhancement ▪ Buttermind – Seth Roberts ▪ http://quantifiedself.com/2011 /01/results-of-the-buttermind- experiment/ Chlorophyll eyes – Gariel Licina http://nerdist.com/chlorophyll-eye-drops-turned- this-biohacker-into-riddick/ RFID implants – Zoltan Istvan http://www.techinsider.io/presidential-candidate- zoltan-istvan-gets-an-rfid-chip-implant-2015-9
- 4. Human Performance Enhancement Northpaw http://sensebridge.net/projects/northpaw/ OpenBCI - http://www.openbci.com/ tDCS – transcranial direct current stimulation
- 5. Genetic Engineering ▪ Easiest to start with bacteria ▪ Yeast is also possible ▪ iGEM - http://igem.org/
- 7. Genetic Engineering ▪ Safety categories and legalities ▪ Safety Category One ▪ Known organisms with no risk to environmental release or human health ▪ Most iGEM projects can fall in here ▪ Will be regulated in 2016 ▪ Safety Category Two ▪ Environmental sampling and cultures ▪ Non-attenuated E. coli, S. aureus, etc. ▪ http://canadianbiosafetystandards.collaboration.gc.ca/index- eng.php
- 8. Genetics and health ▪ 23andme ▪ Public genome project – $1K genome for purchase ▪ Ubiome, SecondGenome, American Gut, etc. ▪ Look at American Gut results, Ubiome ▪ Promethease ▪ That year I gave my sister the gift of Alzheimers ▪ Look at promethease results ▪ Arivale – Lee Hood, Institute for Systems Biology ▪ Review Arivale results ▪ MTHFR in promethease
- 9. Modifying Genomes ● Chromosomal DNA editing ● Similar to zinc fingers and TALENs, but RNA ● Already in the hackerspaces! Kind of. (BioCurious, AddGene)
- 10. Reading and writing genes Writing is getting rapidly cheaper, currently about 25 cents per base. Twist is in alpha on a scalable silicone synthesis platform at 10 cents a base. They hope to be at 2 cents a base in 2 years (That’s still $64 million per human genome, though.)
- 11. Futures: longevity ▪ Methuselah Mouse Prize ▪ Supercentenarians - http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone. 0112430 ▪ Caloric restriction ▪ Metformin and rapamycin
- 12. Futures: intelligence ▪ Beijing Genomics Institute ▪ 25% of the world’s sequencing capacity ▪ Whole cities devoted to biomedical research ▪ Cognitive Genomics ▪ https://www.cog-genomics.org/ ▪ 5 year program to sequence 10,000 people to determine genetic correlates of intelligence ▪ Into their 2nd year and accelerating ▪ Postulate 100 genes most relevant to intelligence, deleterious mutations are like sand in the machine ▪ If all 100 pointed in most favourable direction see 15 SD enhancement ▪ 1 SD of IQ is 15 IQ points, therefore engineered human intelligence of over 300 IQ
- 13. Futures: designer babies ▪ Moratorium on CRISPR work on germline in humans ▪ Simply don’t know enough yet ▪ Regulation in Canada and the US is fairly restrictive ▪ This is an intelligence arms race… ▪ If in a generation we have not permitted human genetic modification and other places have, will we be competitive or obsolete?
- 14. Role of the hackerspaces ▪ Education ▪ Can’t stop learning when you leave school anymore ▪ Push the envelope ▪ Imagine the future, push our laws and society towards the light ▪ Reskill ▪ Biology as information science ▪ Grassroots ▪ What would you like to see engineered? I bet it’s not big agriculture and pesticide resistance… ▪ Businesses ▪ There’s a shift underway in how businesses are started and run, think small ▪ https://agenda.weforum.org/podcast/podcast-the-fourth-industrial- revolution/
- 15. What will you make? What will you make of yourself? [email protected]