Wired does an excellent job of focusing on a day-to-day aspect of an imminently transformative technology. Much is spoken of the coming biotech revolution, but industrial designers like Tuur Van Balen focus on the how biotechnology will present itself at the most basic level:
The 1s and 0s of software live in shiny metals shielded by colourful plastics; biological data lurks in dampness, in pipettes and test tubes. Hacking is about the culture of garages and workshops; DIY bio lives somewhere between the kitchen and the garden. You need mixing bowls and hygiene, beakers and taps. Every article about DIY bio seems to mention a salad-spinner. This isn’t the heavy macho culture of Survival Research Labs and steampunk. We’re moving from BarCamps to Tupperware parties.
Continuing with the theme of biomimetics: artificial technology is gradually merging with natural biology at both ends. Engineers borrow from nature to create new gadgets whilst biotechnologists seek to alter nature to meet human ends.
DIY bio came up at the Dorkbot Boston meeting tonight with Douglas Repetto. One guy was wondering towards the edges of a similar group for bio experimenters.