Today's edition of the Toronto Star carried an item that made me smile in three different senses: Scientists Hack DNA to Spread Malaria-Resistant Gene. On a purely topical level, this could be A Really Big Deal. That makes me smile.
On a purely geeky level, the use of the term "hack" was encouraging. I/T folks like myself have been trying for years to make the distinction between "hackers" (the DIY tinkerer types who have no time for Apple-level polish) and "crackers" (the folks who keep the credit monitoring firms in business...and regular I/T folks awake at night). Alas, the rest of the world doesn't make that distinction, so even white-hat "hackers" are tarred with the same proverbial brush.
And yet...no one (geek or non-geek) likes mosquitoes, so who wouldn't get behind "hacking" their DNA, amirite? [grin]
But the question of semantics and PR is the least of the problems here. Because I yet again have to smile--albeit wryly--at the huge obstacle common to hackers across all disciplines. Namely, the gulf between a working prototype in the lab (or hackathon-occupied conference room) and full-scale adoption in the real world.
Don't get me wrong--this is really-most-sincerely NOT schadenfreude. Half a million lives a year are at stake--most of them children. And the health of two hundred million more people each year is in balance. One would be very, very hard-pressed to overestimate the significance of eliminating mosquitoes as a vector for malaria.
There are 3,500 modern species of mosquitoes, and
their lineage dates back 226 million years. Before deliberate "gene
drive intervention," humans were already triggering the development of
new species by dint of pesticides. "Hacking" every skeeter on the planet will be a knock-down, drag-out slog of decades. But it's a worthy fight...and it sure beats the tar out of poisoning the ecosystem with whatever hell's broth Dow is cooking these days.
As a programmer/tinkerer, my goals aren't even a tenth so audacious and world-changing. But that doesn't mean that I can't appreciate the scaling issues. And the wherewithal it will take to surmount them. All the best, my fellow hackers...you're going to need it. And then some.
