{"id":18203,"date":"2014-05-14T12:53:48","date_gmt":"2014-05-14T12:53:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.editage.com\/insights\/research\/first-semi-synthetic-organism-with-alien-dna-created\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T10:16:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T04:46:13","slug":"first-semi-synthetic-organism-with-alien-dna-created","status":"publish","type":"research","link":"https:\/\/www.editage.com\/insights\/first-semi-synthetic-organism-with-alien-dna-created","title":{"rendered":"First semi-synthetic organism with ‘alien’ DNA created"},"content":{"rendered":"

Researchers from the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., created a semi-synthetic microbe, a genetically modified E. coli bacterium. They created two new nucleotides, X and Y, and fused them into the E. coli bacterium. The E. coli bugs grew and reproduced normally but with six — instead of the standard four — nucleotides, meaning it genetically passed along the first combination of manmade and natural DNA. Potential uses of the technology include the incorporation of a toxic amino acid into a protein to ensure that it kills only cancer cells.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Read more in Nature<\/a>.<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":33313,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false},"new_tags":[],"series":[],"subject":[2976,2974,2975],"class_list":["post-18203","research","type-research","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","subject-and-molecular-biology","subject-biochemistry","subject-genetics"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nFirst semi-synthetic organism with 'alien' DNA created | Editage Insights<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Researchers from the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., created a semi-synthetic microbe, a genetically modified E. coli bacterium. They created two new nucleotides, X and Y, and fused them into the E. coli bacterium. 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