Synthetic Biology’s Second World

Secrecy has long been a part of scientific and innovation practices. Being an ethnographer of laboratories, one occasionally comes up against a barrier of entry to a secret lab or space within a building, protected by intellectual property agreements, military or government contracts. Of course, military science is often conducted in secret, on nuclear, biological or chemical weapons, amongst other things. In his excellent book on ‘Secrecy and Science’, Brian Balmer describes how the Manhattan Project epitomised the way in which scientific secrecy operates at various levels of social organisation:

It was, in fact, an almost unprecedented organisation of not only scientists, but also industry and military. Moreover, a significant feature that accounts for the success of the Manhattan Project is the preoccupation with secrecy at the various sites involved in creating the atomic bomb. Compartmentalisation, telling people information on a strict need-to-know basis, meant only a few people had a complete overview of the project. […] In this manner, efficiency, security, bureaucracy and secrecy all came together at once. (Balmer, 2013: 8)

A poster from the Manhattan Project reminding scientists about the importance of secrecy.

By their nature, it is often the most controversial, risky and ethically dubious research programmes that are conducted in secret, curtained-off from society in order to protect knowledge and technology not only from public scrutiny but also espionage or corporate theft. Thus when we find out that science has been conducted in secret we are generally right to be suspicious, and it should be no surprise that a meeting convened earlier this week, behind closed doors at Harvard, on the prospect of synthesising the human genome, has caused a stir.

Human DNA base pairs

The meeting was convened to discuss the prospects of coordinating a large collaborative venture to follow-up on the Human Genome Project (HGP), that would, over the next decade, seek to construct an entire human genome in a cell line. Currently unfunded but to be prospectively titled ‘HGP-Write: Testing Large Synthetic Genomes in Cells’, it is backed by some of the biggest names in the field.

As the New York Times reports the meeting was invite-only and “The nearly 150 attendees were told not to contact the news media or to post on Twitter during the meeting.” In this regard, it would seem that scientists hosting the meeting wanted for the event to be part of what we could conceptualise – following the sociologist, Georg Simmels’ well-known work on secrecy – as synthetic biology’s ‘second world’. As Simmel argued:

Secrecy secures, so to speak, the possibility of a second world alongside of the obvious world, and the latter is most strenuously affected by the former. Every relationship between two individuals or two groups will be characterized by the ratio of secrecy that is involved in it. Even when one of the parties does not notice the secret factor, yet the attitude of the concealer, and consequently the whole relationship, will be modified by it. (Simmel, 1906: 462)

Synbiophobia phobia poster

A second world for synthetic biology is probably quite appealing to scientists working in the field, a space in which they could run-wild with their ideas without the worry of what a supposedly fearful public might think. Synthetic biologists, for the large part, expect the public will be inappropriately scared of developments in the field. This has led to what Claire Marris (2015) calls ‘synbiophobia phobia’ – the fear that scientists have that the public will fear their work.

Synbiophobia phobia might be at the root of the decision to hold the meeting in private, as the organisers likely anticipated public fear at the potential of creating a human genome from scratch. But, as Simmel’s notion reminds us, no matter whether parties kept in the dark find out about the secrets being kept or not, the effect of secrecy is to change the attitude of the concealer and consequently the whole relationship between scientists and civil society.

Contrary to some scientist’s reactions to the media response to the closed meeting, secrecy in synthetic biology isn’t just a fiction created by newspapers and magazines to whip-up a story. The field does have at least the beginnings of a second world, divorced from public scrutiny, then it is almost certainly going to be tied to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which has had a keen interest in the field since its fledgling years and has invested tens of millions into synthetic biology under the remit of the Biological Technologies Office.

However, speaking to the NYT, George Church, one of the most prominent advocates of synthetic biology and co-organiser of the Harvard meeting, argued that the event had been misconstrued and that the secrecy was actually about protecting a paper currently under review that, if published, would make the ideas for the project publicly-available and thus transparent. But as the invite read, “We intentionally did not invite the media, because we want everyone to speak freely and candidly without concerns about being misquoted or misinterpreted as the discussions evolve.” Whatever the motivation for the closed-doors, invite-only meeting, the effect of concealment might well be the same: it implies that something suspicious is going on.

In this regard, the scientists have shot themselves in the foot. The meeting will worry people, even those who support synthetic biology in general. In fact, one of the most well-known advocates for synthetic biology, Drew Endy, refused to attend and co-authored an open letter criticising the closed meeting. It is only a matter of time until those more critical voices and outright enemies of synthetic biology seize on the secrecy of the meeting as further evidence of untoward ambitions for the field. It would be a mistake, though, to see this as unwarranted fear and ignorance. It has much more to do with the facts of synthetic biology and how it is being developed in relation to corporate interests. As Endy and Zoloth’s (2016: 2) letter argued:

The creation of new human life is one of the last human-associated processes that has not yet been industrialized or fully commodified. It remains an act of faith, joy, and hope. Discussions to synthesize, for the first time, a human genome should not occur in closed rooms.

Two of the common tenets of the emerging frameworks for responsible research and innovation, which has been closely tied to the development of synthetic biology, are the importance of scientific transparency and of deliberative governance processes. The UK Synthetic Biology Roadmap, for example, includes a commitment that the Synthetic Biology Leadership Council should “should provide an exemplar of openness and transparency with two-way stakeholder engagement as a core principle.” (SBRCG, 2012: 32)

Transparancey: More than a window into the lab

But transparency is easier invoked than it is implemented. If scientists are going to take responsible research and innovation seriously, then actually implementing transparency and deliberation is going to be crucial, especially when the choices about such things are immediately within their control, as was the case this week. A second world for synthetic biology might be appealing in principle, but in practice it risks bringing about exactly the kinds of public fears that scientists and engineers worry about.

References

Balmer, B. (2013) Secrecy and science: A historical sociology of biological and chemical warfare. Surrey: Ashgate.

Marris, C. (2015). The construction of imaginaries of the public as a threat to synthetic biology. Science as Culture, 24(1), 83-98.

Simmel, G. (1906) The sociology of secrecy and of secret societies. The American Journal of Sociology, 11(4), 441-498.

SBRCG (2012) A Synthetic Biology Roadmap for the UK, http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/RCUK-prod/assets/documents/publications/SyntheticBiologyRoadmap.pdf

Three Questions I get Asked

Here are three questions that natural scientists and engineers often ask me, and which are commonly asked of social scientists participating in interdisciplinary collaborations. 

1. Why do people not like X?

e.g. why do people not like synthetic food additives?

This question usually has to do with a perception that scientists, or a particular field of scientific work, is not viewed favourably by ‘the public’ or by industry, governments, NGOs, and so on. Natural scientists and engineers sometimes have the impression that social scientists will be able to explain why it is that their technical ambitions have been thwarted by a political misconception or misunderstanding.

The question is sometimes embedded in a range of other faulty assumptions about public understanding of science and science communication. As a question, it can position social scientists as experts in the irrational behaviour of individuals and groups. Social scientists can also be positioned through this style of questioning as brokers, and so be expected to help to open governance and/or public doors.

I’d rather talk about:

What do people actually say and do in relation to X? What practices are involved in regards to X and how do you envision X changing, supplementing or supplanting those practices?

When it comes to something like food additives, for example, I’d be interested to know how people make sense of ‘synthetic’ and ‘natural’ from within cooking, eating, feeding and caring practices. We could ask in what ways are these concepts important to the organisation of such practices, or in what ways do these practices organise our demarcations of those concepts? It could be important to explore how novel methods of producing food additives sit alongside or displace existing methods of production, and with what global socioeconomic implications.

In this regard we could begin to understand why the notion or production of synthetic food additives might raise socio-political, economic or ethical questions from publics, NGOs, governments and so forth, rather than assuming people don’t like it because of ignorance.

 

2. What will people think of X?

e.g. what will people think of brain-based lie detection?

This type of question usually has to do with natural scientists’ worries about what ‘the public’ will think about their planned innovations or technical recommendations. It comes from a recognition that publics are interested and invested in scientific knowledge production. However, it is often motivated by a desire to ensure that people will think positively about X and so sometimes accompanied by a will to understand how to encourage people to feel positively about X.

The question is sometimes embedded in a range of other faulty assumptions about how people’s negative feelings about proposed technologies will inexorably lead to market failure and that this is necessarily a bad thing. It positions social scientists as PR gurus or pollsters, who can help to take the public temperature and design marketing strategies for innovations.

I’d rather talk about:

What kinds of imagined (necessary, likely, possible or peripheral) actions, routines, relations and social structures are being embedded in the sociotechnical work being conducted? In other words, putting the emphasis not so much on the object of technical interest but on how the envisaged object might impact upon existing practices of life, relations and social order, or open-up new practices. Do we want these kinds of practices and why/ why not? What effects will these changes have and with what implications for people’s experiences of social and technical phenomena?

In the given example of brain-based lie detection, I would want to know more about how we do lie detection now in different contexts and why we do it that way. I’d be interested to know how brain-based techniques would change these contexts if implemented and what implications such changes might have for our ways of living with each other. If we were talking about using brain scanning as evidence for use in legal proceedings, for example, we’d have to think carefully about why we currently use the investigation, interview, interrogation and jury systems. How would brain-based technologies fit in these practices and what would change? What kinds of life and forms of justice are implicated in such changes?

In this regard we could begin to unpick some of the tangle of concepts, practices, norms, politics and so on that are bound up with our current ways of doing lie detection and thus better understand what would be at stake for someone who is asked to give an opinion on a new lie detection technology.

 

3. Is it okay to do X?

e.g. is it okay to engineer life?

This question usually has to do with a perceived ethical ‘implication’ of some proposed technical innovation. The questions often centre on technical objects. They involve a recognition that sociotechnical innovation generally implies changes in how things are done or understood. They might have to do with abstract concepts like life or nature. However, by emphasising the objects of technical innovation or abstract questions these kinds of concerns largely miss the everyday practices that are at the heart of how ethical decisions and dispositions are made and formed.

This type of question is sometimes embedded in a range of assumptions about scientific objectivity and how ethical implications arise only from the implementation of knowledge and new technologies in the world rather than in the practices of knowledge production itself. In addition, such questions often come with the implication that X is going to happen anyway, but it would be good to know what moral status it is going to be given when it does happen.

This style of questioning is more comfortable for some social scientists than others, since some of us are experts in ethics. However, in the way the question is generally posed it positions social scientists as ethical arbiters, who themselves are being asked to judge the moral status of objects and so assess the social value of proposed innovations in order to help scientists justify actions they know they are going to take. This is a bit tricky and can be a far less comfortable space to inhabit.

I’d rather talk about:

What kinds of moral or ethical values are embedded in the scientific practices out of which the question has emerged? In other words, what has been decided about ethics already, what kinds of questions have been closed off and with what justification?

I’d also be looking to explore what kinds of ethics and norms are used in contexts in which the proposed X is being invoked. Are there differences in the ethical frameworks used to think about X across different spaces and times and in what ways do these differ? If there are differences of opinion about the ethical valence of X how do we decide amongst such opinions in governance, regulation, and technical innovation practices?  

Can Scientists Engage Critically with Capitalism?

At a recent meeting of the synthetic biology community, SB6.0, researchers from around the world descended on Imperial College London to discuss the state of affairs in standardising the engineering of biology. Embedded into the programme of events were some discussions of knowledge translation and that most recent of neoliberal terms for technoscience governance, ‘responsible innovation’.

Jack Stilgoe, an STS scholar at UCL, has been one important figure in cementing the use of this term in governance circles, which – understandably – both excites and troubles him. He, along with many of us interested in the sociology of knowledge, have seen responsible innovation be rapidly taken-up like a standardised plasmid by a competent cell. As biologists and sociologists alike will tell you, though: (cellular) context is important. So what happens in different spaces to the terminology and practices of responsible innovation? We don’t know as yet, but synbio is an interesting and important place to watch some of this unfold.

Responsibility sounds like a good word to hear in this context, and when coupled to innovation it promises perhaps a more critical engagement with the relationships between industry and academy. Synthetic biology is certainly a space in which these relations are currently being negotiated, whether in the production of artemisinin or the development of novel forms of pedagogy and sharing.

One of the primary tenets of responsible innovation, whatever form it might take in different sociotechnical spaces, is that innovators (whether they’re natural scientists, engineers, industrialists or so on) have to engage substantively with the concerns of publics. This means more than listening. It means changing what you’re doing and what you plan to do in your innovations by virtue of those engagements.

Scientists tend to think that public actors are mostly worried about frankenfoods and grey goo, assuming that publics misunderstand science and thus hold incorrect opinions about its implications. Indeed (though I’m so tired of saying it I want to scream) I still spend significant amounts of time in meetings explaining this assumption, challenging it and showing how alternative accounts of public actors are far more fruitful for engagement and – dare I say it – for science as well.

How is responsible innovation being adopted in synbio? In perhaps the most prominent example, the findings of the synthetic biology dialogue report  are not so much integrated into research practices but are instead regularly trotted out at conferences and in interviews as evidence that synthetic biologists and the RCUK are doing responsible innovation. It becomes used as a sign of responsibility but not a provocation to it. Some of the primary findings of that dialogue continue to be overlooked when synthetic biologists talk about their work. There’s still a huge reliance on the idea that  public actors are largely troubled by the objects of science: in this context, engineered microorganisms. Contrary to this assumption, the dialogue showed that the people involved  were not only interested in the objects of science but also significantly concerned with the processes and imaginaries of scientific innovations. One important question was about the use of public money to fund synthetic biology; the danger being that scientists could get too cosy with industry, patent everything, and focus narrowly on making a successful, profit-generating innovation.

Something of a stir was caused at the SB6.0 conference by activists from Luddites200 and Biofuelwatch handing out an open letter to the delegates as they entered the building. There were some conversations and tweets about it, and Tom Ellis from Imperial posed the questions from the activists’ letter to the panel on responsible innovation. I think this is a signal that synthetic biologists are interested in engaging with a debate about public and NGO concerns.

However, the letter seems largely to have been understood only as an uninformed attack on synthetic biology. For example, Alex Taylor wrote a quick blog post about the letter, where he noted how it raised interesting points for discussion. But he went on to deal mostly with the points he could transform into technical questions, or took up assertions in the letter he could pit against assertions of his own (synbio is bad; synbio is good). His response missed much of the message of the letter, which is primarily about the industrialisation of biology (clearly a question important to the Luddites200 movement, which is concerned with ensuring capital and technology serves the commonality and not vice versa). Take the following paragraph from the open letter:

“If the problem were just conceptual, it wouldn’t be so bad. But synthetic biology’s technocratic projects have massively damaging practical consequences. Time and again the cause of these disasters is that the technocratic mindset leads you to mis-define the problem as technical, when its real cause is social. Your tool is a hammer, so every problem looks to you like a nail. The real cause of climate change is industrial capitalism, and it can’t be fixed with biofuels. Such technofixes are always intended to keep the system that caused the problem going. And because they are part of the problem they perpetuate it: in the quest to supply our absurd overuse of energy and to prop up the profit-making of multinational companies, biofuels are already leading to environmental damage, hunger and the grabbing of land from Third World farmers.”

Of this, Taylor says:

“The author makes some interesting points about the use of biofuels and, presumably, GM (which is the research field that synthetic biology has seemingly assimilated). Whilst the inappropriate, unilateral and unethical use of these technologies is certainly something we, as a society, must be mindful of, I would point out that the potential benefits clearly warrant further investigation. Like all scientific endeavours, synthetic biology and its applications […] must be conducted in an evidence-based and academically rigorous manner. I do not deny that synthetic biology has the potential to be dangerous, but it is only through careful research – good science – that we find out how to make biotechnology better, cheaper and safer, and to study the consequences of human action – if there is evidence to be had that the natural world is at risk from human intervention then it is we, scientists such as those attending the SB6.0 conference, who are your strongest allies.”

This response positions questions of ethics and inappropriate use of technologies as things of which to be ‘mindful’ whilst ensuring that we explore the potential benefits. The appeal is to evidence-based application and academic rigour, coupled to promises of “better, cheaper and safer” biotechnology and an assertion that with evidence of risks to the natural world scientists will be on their/your side. This doesn’t respond to the argument put forward in the letter, which – in regard to biofuels – doesn’t concern their technical risks and costs but rather the way in which their adoption would support current structures of industrial (biotech) capitalism. These are not things about which evidence is easy to accrue or display.

Without wishing this blog post to become more a question of “can Alex Taylor engage critically with capitalism?”, (which would of course be an unjust focus) I do think his response is characteristic of technical experts when they discuss their work with NGO groups and social scientists in the context of questions about industry, capitalism and technology. This makes me wonder, can scientists engage critically with capitalism?

Synthetic biology is a good place to pose the question because it is resoundingly co-opted into the current development of the bioeconomy. David Willets announced a whole bunch of funding at the conference, there’s loads coming up for Centres from the BBSRC and EPSRC. Willets has also positioned synbio as one of the eight great technologies that will save the economy and – one is encouraged to imagine – the world. This happens because individual scientists and governance actors shape the present by promises of the future. For example, the politically-savvy Richard Kitney pushed hard for the UK RoadMap, is co-director of CSynBi and now runs the IKC in synbio. But it isn’t just people that make these things happen. In the story of industry, profit and engineering, the practices and norms of engineering were themselves importantly shaped by processes of industrialisation and vice versa. The notions of efficiency, standardisation, specialisation, abstraction and so on thus operate in both worlds as engineering shaped capital and capital shaped engineering. The ontological remit of synthetic biology to create novel parts has eagerly begun to embed this technopolitical economic system of norms, values and processes into biological material and the shaping of synbio research practices. Even the pursuit of sharing practices ostensibly intended to open-up knowledge and the material of synbio is based on such processes. The creation of these spaces of innovation with biological organisms are premised on a future in which more and more people have access to synbio techniques and materials, and on the meritocractic assumption that wealth goes only to those with merit. The imaginary and vision of synbio, borrowed from the computer industry, promises a bohemian, Google-like ‘Don’t Be Evil’, Silicon Valley of synbio entrepreneurs who built cool bio gadgets, saved poor people and made a fortune. This is the modern neo-liberal promise, in which anyone can unshackle themselves from poverty by using knowledge and their own bootstraps to pull themselves out of the structures in which they were born and reach the heights of social order.

All of this is so far removed from the practical concerns of activists struggling to make their voice and concerns heard that it’s no wonder everyone ends up talking at crossed wires. Activists are concerned, for example, with how contemporary neoliberal responses to the banking crisis only furthers austerity, making poorer people poorer and rich people richer. These are not questions for economists to worry about whilst synthetic biologists carry on making cool widgets. They have to be asked at the nexus of science and the economy, particularly when science is being positioned as the backbone of that economy. I imagine a lot of synthetic biologists genuinely hope their innovations will alleviate poverty and inequality and that they can do this through the processes in which they are embedded. But their dreams of the future are inherently invested with the ideology in which they have to work. If they want to secure funding, progress in their careers, train up new postgraduates and postdocs, secure a lab, be able to pursue their own interests and so on, they have to play the game of neoliberal technocracy. I empathise deeply with this situation because it is the one in which I also work. However, I’ve got a whole bunch of critical tools that, although they don’t allow me to completely remove myself from the context, allow me to critically engage with it. If there’s one thing science could do better in the current context of impact and responsibility, it would be to get more critical. Again, this doesn’t mean just being anti-capitalism or anti-technology, but rather engaging substantively with its processes, promises and implications.

As such, I think perhaps the most pressing question facing synthetic biology if it is to be truly responsible in its innovation has to be a detailed and deeply practical concern with whether the science is done in service of people everywhere or in the service of corporations. This is exactly the kind of thing that the participants of the synthetic biology dialogue have in mind. That means reassurances based on technical solutions won’t be adequate to the public concerns with synthetic biology.

The final sentence of the open letter states that “if humanity is going to get out of the hole that technocratic capitalism has dug, we need to stop digging.” This doesn’t mean quitting synthetic biology out of fear of mutant microorganisms. It isn’t threatening a revolt based on ignorance. Instead, it asks scientists to open themselves up to the contexts in which their practices are based because those scientific developments are part of those contexts. I don’t know the people at Luddites200, and I would not have written the letter with the same tone, but I think some of their questions are important to consider in ways that don’t reduce the issues to ‘merely’ technical problems. Responsibility here means taking seriously the challenge that synthetic biology might serve to further global crises and inequalities rather than ameliorate them. If synthetic biologists want to be truly responsible they have to talk openly about their plans to profit from their microorganisms. What was the justification for the funding of the research and how will that impact on the direction of the work? Where will the money go? Where did the money come from? And who owns the patents? What effects will the capitalisation of some synbio device have on economies outside of the UK, Europe and USA? Where will (un)employment happen? What will the labour be like and is it sustainable? What kinds of lives does the invention make possible and what kinds does it foreclose? These kinds of questions are not addenda to the issue of technical design. They cannot be fixed with kill-switches or bland assurances that ethics are being considered. These questions have to be built into the organisation of research projects, their funding, their obligations to social groups, their daily laboratory practices, and ultimately into the objects themselves.

The potential of responsible innovation will depend greatly on how the question of responsibility is understood. In the pursuit of their own academic interests, and in their important and valuable technical explorations and adventures in synthetic biology, it will be essential for synthetic biologists to ask: in the game of synthetic life, who wins and who loses?

Bacterial Cultures: How engineers make sense of microorganisms

Vast pools of sewage stretch into the distance at a facility

This post relates to a paper I recently published, which you can download here. 

Conducting an ethnography of a sewage facility, in the midst of sludge and mud and sewage I found my sociological nous rather tested: what was there to say about water treatment processes that could be remotely interesting? Everything was brown and wet. So it was more than my professional lenses that were steaming. Indeed, the stink permeated every fabric and seemed to coat every surface. The process engineers in the facility have a number of strategies for keeping themselves safe in this perilous space. A lot of these techniques have to do with routine practices of managing their bodies: becoming physically comfortable with the grime (“You get used to it.”), improving their balance when walking on wet mud (“My first fall nearly broke my back, so I was careful after.”), wearing two pairs of gloves and socks, and learning a variety of safety procedures (for climbing ladders and so on). Moreover, the process engineers use a range of scripts, anecdotes and narratives for understanding their relationship with the dirt and grime, which was particularly interesting to me when it involved their understandings of microorganisms.

The vast pools of brown sludge that bubble and threaten to engulf you if you trip are also full of bacteria. Intriguingly, the bacteria are similarly understood in relation to the body and practices of maintaining the body’s boundaries. There is an ambiguity about whether engineers understand their bodies as safely protected and separated out from the bacteria (practices are largely organised around covering and cleaning the body) or become attuned to their relation with the bacteria. This is because the engineers tell stories of immunological adaptation. Their stories often involve anecdotes of visitors getting sick, or of new employees getting used to the bacteria. A new recruit to a facility I visited described how he’d had stomach aches and felt sick on-and-off for the first few weeks of working there. He told me that his body had ‘adapted’ and that he now didn’t get sick from the bacteria. Your immune system, he said, “get’s used to them.” The grime is thus a permanent symbol of the omnipresence of bacteria – there’s no escaping them. Rather than coding the bacteria as simply ‘threatening’ or ‘dangerous’ the engineers ‘adapt’ their bodies and practices in ways that alter their understandings both of their bodies and of the bacteria. In this regard, the ontological status of the engineering body in the waste facility is importantly related to the ontological status of bacteria.

These observations of sewerage facilities formed part of our work on synthetic biology, which also involved observations in microbiology laboratories. In the lab, everything is suddenly white. White walls, white stools, white counters, white powders, white liquids, white equipment. I find myself wearing white lab coats. White gloves at the entrance, white gloves on the counter, white gloves stacked onto shelves three deep and ten across. I get used to the feeling of nitrile gloves. The lab is a place where things have to be clean, so there’s also a noxious smelling alcohol routinely spritzed and wiped across the counters.

I hold some bacteria in solution in a falcon tube.

Some of the labs are temperature controlled, whereas others are fine at room temperature. Some have distinctive whirring, clicking or screeching noises created by the specialist equipment.  But although they differ in important ways, they nonetheless share a significant common feature: they are all organised in order to safely manipulate the microbiological realm. This organisation, however, is ultimately determined not by the deterrence of release of these unique organisms, but by prevention of infiltration of more common species that might contaminate the lab apparatuses and thus ruin experiments. Indeed, in the lab the bacteria are at risk. They are engineered to be easy to manipulate and have thus become more susceptible to being out-competed by ‘natural’ bacteria. Practices in the lab are thus geared primarily around protecting the bacteria from the body. And whilst academic engineers are aware of the dangers of the bacteria with which they work, which are often quite minimal, they are generally most concerned with the dangers that their skin (covered with enzymes), the air (filled with stronger strains) and their equipment pose for their microorganisms. Indeed, the bacteria even look puny – tiny quantities in tiny flasks that are barely visible to the naked eye. This is a wholly different world to that of the sewage plant and the bodies of lab engineers are thus importantly different because of these different relations.

This is an important consideration when examining the governance and regulation of engineered microorganisms and when discussing ‘public’ understandings of this science. We explore these issues through other ethnographic episodes in the paper.

Bacterial cultures: Ontologies of bacteria and engineering expertise at the nexus of synthetic biology and water services, Engineering Studies

You can get the paper here:

http://www.academia.edu/3189976/Bacterial_Cultures_Ontologies_of_Bacteria_and_Engineering_at_the_Nexus_of_Synthetic_Biology_and_Water_Services