It may soon be possible to create "mirror life"

Scientists at the J. Craig Venter Institute have made a breakthrough in synthetic biology by successfully creating a living cell with a completely synthetic genome. The achievement, described in a paper published in the journal Nature, demonstrates the possibility of creating a 'mirror life' form that can replicate and evolve independently. The team used a machine learning algorithm to design the genome, which was then assembled and inserted into a yeast cell. The resulting cell, called 'Syn3.0', was able to grow and divide, producing a population of identical cells. While the achievement is a significant milestone, it also raises questions about the ethics of creating life in a lab. The team's work was funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH).