Astrobiology, is a scientific field within the life and environmental sciences that studies the origins, early evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe by investigating its deterministic conditions and contingent events. As a discipline, astrobiology is founded on the premise that life may exist beyond Earth.
Terraforming or terraformation ("Earth-shaping") is the hypothetical process of deliberately modifying the atmosphere, temperature, surface topography or ecology of a planet, moon, or other body to be similar to the environment of Earth to make it habitable for humans to live on.
Biomimetics or biomimicry is the emulation of the models, systems, and elements of nature for the purpose of solving complex human problems. The terms "biomimetics" and "biomimicry" are derived from Ancient Greek: βίος (bios), life, and μίμησις (mīmēsis), imitation, from μιμεῖσθαι (mīmeisthai), to imitate, from μῖμος (mimos), actor. A closely related field is bionics.
Synthetic biology (SynBio) is a multidisciplinary field of science that focuses on living systems and organisms, and it applies engineering principles to develop new biological parts, devices, and systems or to redesign existing systems found in nature.
George McDonald Church is an American geneticist, molecular engineer, chemist, serial entrepreneur, and pioneer in personal genomics and synthetic biology. He is the Robert Winthrop Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School, Professor of Health Sciences and Technology at Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a founding member of the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University.
Biobased economy, bioeconomy or biotechonomy is economic activity involving the use of biotechnology and biomass in the production of goods, services, or energy. The terms are widely used by regional development agencies, national and international organizations, and biotechnology companies. They are closely linked to the evolution of the biotechnology industry and the capacity to study, understand, and manipulate genetic material that has been possible due to scientific research and technological development. This includes the application of scientific and technological developments to agriculture, health, chemical, and energy industries.
Christopher Voigt is an American synthetic biologist, molecular biophysicist, and engineer.
BMC Systems Biology was an open access peer-reviewed scientific journal that covered research in systems biology. Filling a gap in what was a new research field, the journal was established in 2007 and is published by BioMed Central. Part of the BMC Series of journals, it had a broad scope covering the engineering of biological systems, network modelling, quantitative analyses, integration of different levels of information and synthetic biology.
Tardigrades, known colloquially as water bears or moss piglets, are a phylum of eight-legged segmented micro-animals. They were first described by the German zoologist Johann August Ephraim Goeze in 1773, who called them Kleiner Wasserbär. In 1777, the Italian biologist Lazzaro Spallanzani named them Tardigrada, which means "slow steppers".
Lynn Justine Rothschild is an evolutionary biologist, astrobiologist and synthetic biologist at NASA's Ames Research Center, and is an adjunct professor at Brown University. She was a consulting Professor at Stanford University, where she taught Astrobiology and Space Exploration. At Ames, her research has focused on how life, particularly microbes, has evolved in the context of the physical environment, both on Earth and potentially beyond our planet's boundaries. Her research also explores the use of synthetic biology as an enabling tool for space travel. Since 2007, she has studied the effect of UV radiation on DNA synthesis, carbon metabolism and mutation/DNA repair in the Rift Valley of Kenya and the Bolivian Andes, and also in high altitude experiments atop Mount Everest, in balloon payloads with BioLaunch. She was the principal investigator of the first free-flyer synthetic biology payload which flew on the DLR EuCROPIS mission. In 2024, she received a Phase III NIAC grant to explore the use of fungi for constructing habitats on the Moon or Mars.
Synthetic virology is a branch of virology engaged in the study and engineering of synthetic man-made viruses. It is a multidisciplinary research field at the intersection of virology, synthetic biology, computational biology, and DNA nanotechnology, from which it borrows and integrates its concepts and methodologies. There is a wide range of applications for synthetic viral technology such as medical treatments, investigative tools, and reviving organisms.
ATUM is an American biotechnology company. ATUM provides tools for the design and synthesis of optimized DNA, as well as protein production and GMP cell line development.
Christina Smolke is an American synthetic biologist whose primary research is in the use of yeast to produce opioids for medical use. She is a Full Professor of Bioengineering and of Chemical Engineering at Stanford University. She is the editor of The metabolic pathway engineering handbook (2010). She is an advisory board member for Integrative Biology.
Cellular agriculture focuses on the production of agricultural products from cell cultures using a combination of biotechnology, tissue engineering, molecular biology, and synthetic biology to create and design new methods of producing proteins, fats, and tissues that would otherwise come from traditional agriculture. Most of the industry is focused on animal products such as meat, milk, and eggs, produced in cell culture rather than raising and slaughtering farmed livestock which is associated with substantial global problems of detrimental environmental impacts, animal welfare, food security and human health. Cellular agriculture is a field of the biobased economy. The most well known cellular agriculture concept is cultured meat.
Karmella Ann Haynes is a biomedical engineer and associate professor at the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University. She researches how chromatin is used to control cell development in biological tissue.
Christina Maria Agapakis is a synthetic biologist, science writer. She is the Creative Director of the biotechnology company Ginkgo Bioworks.
China National GeneBank or CNGB is China's first national-level gene storage bank, approved and funded by the Chinese government. Based in the Dapeng Peninsula of Shenzhen, CNGB's mission is to support public welfare, life science research and innovation, as well as industry incubation, through effective bioresource conservation, digitalization and utilization.
A living medicine is a type of biologic that consists of a living organism that is used to treat a disease. This usually takes the form of a cell or a virus that has been genetically engineered to possess therapeutic properties that is injected into a patient. Perhaps the oldest use of a living medicine is the use of leeches for bloodletting, though living medicines have advanced tremendously since that time.
Elizabeth Anne Specht is an American research scientist who is Vice President for Science and Technology at The Good Food Institute. She leads the development of a roadmap for the acceleration of alternative protein research. In 2022, Vox named her in one of their "Future Perfect 50".
Mark Kotter is a neurosurgeon, biologist, and entrepreneur.
