The Journal (Newcastle, UK)

Bioscience Is Our Future

The advent of the personal computer has had a profound effect upon all of us and there is little doubt the Information Technology revolution will characterise the latter part of this century. So what will characterise the early part of the next?

Undoubtedly it will be the subject which is substantially more far reaching that it, that of biotechnology. With progress at an unprecedented rate, we are at the beginning of a revolution so profound that all of our lives will be touched forever.

So what is biotechnology? Well surprisingly, it is arguably the oldest profession [or one of them] since it concerns man utilising living organisms for its own benefit.

We have of course been making wine, cheese, yoghurt, farming plants and animals and baking for countless generations, all of which use microbes and higher organisms for man's purposes and which were then the beginnings of biotechnology.

It is in the last 20 years or so when we have learnt to control and manipulate DNA, the universal code of life, that our knowledge has increased exponentially and a series of unprecedented opportunities have presented themselves.

As with all new technologies we in society must ensure that the benefits outweigh the risks, but it is salutary to reflect on the evolution of the motor car; at first introduction it was considered so dangerous that an individual was tasked with walking in front of it with a red flag so that the car did not exceed 4mph.

Given the number of people killed on our roads each year, despite safety measures, the car should be considered a dangerous beast. Yet we still accept it. Biotechnology is at the age of the car with a 4mph restriction; society must assess the benefits and control the risks.

There is however, little doubt that we are at the decision point. The government is strongly in favour of biotechnology as a means for creation of wealth and jobs.

It is the hottest area for creation of regional and national competitiveness and via the Foresight programme, we should embrace biotechnology as the means to enhance productivity across a range of sectors.

The majority of investment in biotechnology is devoted to the development of new drugs.

Despite all of our effort to date we still only have treatments [and not necessarily cures] for 350 of the approximately 3,440 diseases known to man. There is clearly a long way to go.

Biotechnology offers us the opportunity to progress new drug development in a way that is unprecedented, since it accelerates the number of new 'leads' that the industry has to work with.

It will all come from the information that will be processed from the Human Genome Project, a global project in which we in the UK have a significant presence and which aims to decipher the code of human DNA.

But we cannot expect new drugs to be available overnight. The computing power necessary to analyse this information is still in its infancy.

The information is slightly different in each human and therefore needs to be thoroughly analysed to find out which pieces of information are relevant to particular diseases. The right targets must be selected and the drugs designed and put through clinical trials.

This information is the same as that which the popular press believe will enable us to make 'designer babies'. For the moment, this is quite impossible.

But society is right to be considering the implications here and now.

But these reports should not be allowed to detract from the massive amount of good work that is going into development of new cures and treatments for debilitating disease, which are based on biotechnology.

Biotechnology however, is also characterised by the wide range of industries to which it could give competitive advantage.

Businesses large and small, high-tech or low-tech will find opportunity in biotechnology and it is not just in the domain of big pharmaceutical companies.

This includes new methods to clean up the environment, use of microbes for manufacturing, new biological materials - like that from spiders' silk and a range of functional foods to name but a few.

Indeed, for nearly all of the Foresight areas [thematic and sectoral panels] applications of biotechnology can be envisaged, which underlies its importance.

We in the Bioscience Centre are fortunate to be involved in the Foresight programme and are aiming to become one of Europe's leading centres for the ethical exploitation of biotechnology.

We are developing the complete 'one-stop shop for biotechnology companies with laboratory space, conferencing, training and contact research.

With the associated benefit of being part of the visionary International Centre for Life project, there is a very bright and exciting future for wealth and job creation in the North East by exploitation of biotechnology.