67. Synthetic biology: Distraction, or conservation's future? (Kent Redford)

Synthetic biology, the engineering of life at the genetic level, is advancing at pace. Much of the public conversation fixates on de-extinction and charismatic creatures like woolly mammoths, dire wolves, and moas, but is that really what matters in this new world we are looking at? And while we debate whether these technologies should be applied to the natural world at all, massive investment in human medicine and agriculture is already releasing genetically modified organisms into open systems, including soils, freshwater, oceans, and even our own bodies. Synthetic biology also raises difficult questions about who benefits, who bears the costs, and what it means when private intellectual property becomes embedded in the genome of an endangered species.

To explore all of this, I spoke with returning guest on the show Kent Redford, a conservation scientist who has spent well over a decade trying to bring synthetic biology to the attention of conservationists. We discuss the blurry line between genetic engineering and synthetic biology, the promise and peril of engineered gene drives, and why he believes the field's obsession with de-extinction is largely a waste of time. Kent also makes a deeper, more unsettling argument: that conservation is gripped by a kind of "Holocene hubris," still trying to restore a past that is already slipping away.

Links to resources

• Strange Natures: Conservation in the Era of Synthetic Biology - Kent's book on synthetic biology in conservation
• Synthetic soil crusts against green-desert transitions - 2021 article by Solé and co-authors 
• Beneficial Microorganisms for Corals (BMC): Proposed Mechanisms for Coral Health and Resilience - 2017 artilce by Peixoto and co-authors

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