The AP ran a story the other day about people working with DNA in their garages (or apartments). For example, a woman in San Francisco is trying to engineer yogurt bacteria that will glow green in the presence of melamine. This is the chemical that was found in baby formula and pet food from China.

The idea would be that you (or some governmental agency) could check your yogurt with a UV light before you ate it. If it glowed green, then the yogurt was contaminated with melamine.

These glowing bacteria could help a lot of people avoid melamine poisoning (as long as people could get past the fact that they'd be eating a GMO!). But do we really want people doing this kind of biology at home?

Of course this sort of thing would be very difficult to stop. People can go to science fair project sites and get all the information they need to jury rig a lot of the equipment to do these kinds of experiments. They can also search the web or take a class at their local community college and learn most everything they need to know.

In fact, the technology to do this kind of stuff is so straightforward that we do something similar here at The Tech. We let visitors put a gene in bacteria that causes the bacteria to glow green only in the presence of a special sugar called arabinose.

So unless we put up massive resources to shut down these labs (a "War on Amateur Labs"), people are going to be able to do this stuff if they want to. To me, the two big questions are:

• Will anything useful come out of these labs?
• Will something dangerous be released onto an unsuspecting public?

Odds are that nothing too useful will come out of these labs. Sure the melamine bacterium could be useful (it is actually very similar to the outlawed glowing goldfish designed to detect pollutants in the water). But it would be very hard to bring to market. Two potential problems are getting people to eat a GMO and proving to the FDA that it is safe.

One good thing that might come out of this sort of thing is to make biology more accessible and maybe more exciting too. People might think of and do projects for fun that, as a necessary part of accomplishing their goal, will increase their understanding of molecular biology. In other words, they might be more willing to learn this stuff for something fun they thought of.

I can imagine some dangers too. What if someone decides to come up with an anthrax vaccine and makes a dangerous bug that gets loose? Or who knows what else?

There probably isn't a big risk in something like this happening but biology is different than coming up with a new computer program or light bulb in your garage. Biology uses live things that can make copies of themselves and spread pretty far pretty quickly. Traditional labs have controls in place to keep these sorts of things from happening. These unregulated labs may or may not be that careful.

A group in Boston that promotes do-it-yourself biology:

http://diybio.org/

How to make some molecular biology lab equipment at home http://www.scq.ubc.ca/the-macgyver-project-genomic-dna-extraction-and-gel-electrophoresis-experiments-using-everyday-materials/

Once upon a time in the far away land of Hong Kong, a woman named Jill Robinson discovered that beautiful moon bears where being held captive in tiny cages in China and farmed (through their bellies) as a living source for bear bile, which is used in traditional medicines. She decided to do something heroic about the issue and founded the Animals Asia Foundation. Animals Asia became a thriving organization, dedicated to ending cruelty and restoring respect for all animals in Asia.

For many moon bears, their stories have a happy ending. Jill and the AAF crew have rescued 500 bears, releasing them into their idyllic sanctuary in Chengdu China. Newly rescued moon bears tentatively step on fresh grass, slowly learn to climb, socialize, scamper through bamboo, wrestle and eat honey, finally becoming a real bear.

Of course, the bears can't go from cages to sanctuary directly; they must endure urgent veterinary care and often surgery to remove the bile equipment from their bodies. Bears must be anaesthetized to receive this care and it is important that they stay warm and comfortable during the process. Just as with humans, the bears' extremities are the first things to get cold and that is where knitters on the West Coast of the United States, worlds away, come in. They must knit giant bear mittens!

The Oakland Zoo is hoping to have some mittens knitted in order to hand them directly to Jill Robinson on May 21, when she speaks at the Oakland Zoo. We will have a knitting party at the zoo on Friday, May 9, from 1pm-3pm. However, mittens can be turned in to the Oakland Zoo at anytime and mailed to China in the hopes that the thousands of moon bears still in captivity will need them soon.

The mitten pattern allows for several weights of yarn and includes instructions for knitting in the round with one circular, two circulars, double-pointed needles, or knitting flat. Finished mittens are about 7″ wide (14″ circumference) with a 12″ foot and 6″ cuff. The pattern is intended to be beginner level, but if you have any questions about the techniques mentioned, you might find the website knittinghelp.com helpful.

Click here for the pattern and try it yourself:

bearbooties.pdf

The Oakland Zoo will be working with Article Pract in Oakland on more mittens for bears.

Find out more about Moon Bears and their plight, and meet Jill Robinson on Wednesday, May 21 at 6:30 for the lecture entitle, "From Prison to Paradise: Rescuing the Endangered Asian Moon Bear. Bring the family to Bear Day at the Oakland Zoo on Saturday, May 17.

Some of this information is thanks to Twisted, the Knit Shop in Oregon who is helping the Oregon zoo knit mittens.


Amy Gotliffe is Conservation Manager at The Oakland Zoo.