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. 2015 Aug;21(4):1065-83.
doi: 10.1007/s11948-014-9591-3. Epub 2014 Sep 24.

Biosecurity and Open-Source Biology: The Promise and Peril of Distributed Synthetic Biological Technologies

Nicholas G Evans  1 , Michael J Selgelid
Affiliations

Biosecurity and Open-Source Biology: The Promise and Peril of Distributed Synthetic Biological Technologies

Nicholas G Evans et al. Sci Eng Ethics. 2015 Aug.

Abstract

In this article, we raise ethical concerns about the potential misuse of open-source biology (OSB): biological research and development that progresses through an organisational model of radical openness, deskilling, and innovation. We compare this organisational structure to that of the open-source software model, and detail salient ethical implications of this model. We demonstrate that OSB, in virtue of its commitment to openness, may be resistant to governance attempts.

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