西亚试剂：Such feats are beyond the reach of do-it-yourself (DIY) ‘bi

Such feats are beyond the reach of do-it-yourself (DIY) ‘biohackers’, a growing community ofamateur biologists who often work in community laboratories, which typically charge a recurring fee for access to equipment and supplies. But CRISPR itself is not. Driven by an inventive spirit that inspires them to fiddle with yeast to alter the flavour of beer, build art installations out of bacteria or pursue serious basic-research questions, these amateurs cannot wait to try the technique.

“It’s, like, the most amazing tool ever,” says Andreas Stürmer, a biohacker and entrepreneur who lives in Dublin. “You could do it in your own home.”

Sosa is an IT consultant from San Jose, California, who took up biohacking as a hobby about three years ago, when he decided that he would like to grow organs — or maybe other body parts — in the lab. At first, he had no idea how unrealistic that goal was. “I just thought you take a bunch of stem cells and add stuff to them,” he says.

The challenge of manipulating living cells sank in as he began to read molecular-biology textbooks, attend seminars and teach himself laboratory techniques. He joined the BioCurious community lab in Sunnyvale, California.

Sosa is not quite sure what he will do with CRISPR once he has mastered it. He might participate in a group effort at BioCurious to engineer yeast to produce casein, a protein found in milk, as a step towards making vegan cheese. That could involve using CRISPR to learn how proteins are chemically modified in different types of yeast. “Now we have this ability to do what the major labs have been doing all this time,” he says. “It’s very exciting.”

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