[open-science] Bio-commons white paper

[Jenny Molloy]

Hi All


See message below from Rüdiger Trojok about a white paper on the biological
commons - I hope you're able to contribute on github and discussion on this
list is also encouraged!


Jenny



Dear Biohackers, tinkerers, Citizens and Bio-Commoners,


in June we had a little workshop on the festival Pixelache in Helsinki on
the topic of the Commons (e.g. creative commons).

There, a number of biohackers and citizens from Europe and Asia discussed
ways to make the concept of the commons fruitful for the life science.



Abstract


With increasing knowledge and technical skill, the sphere in which
intentional intervention in nature are possible will further be expanded.
Alternative IP regimes such as open-access and open-source could in future
help to leverage the cost for research and development in the life
sciences, mobilize unused knowledge and become more adaptable to spark new
inventions. Citizens proposed a ‘Bio-Commons’ license model to put
biological innovation into service to society and at the same time limit
the potential misuse of knowledge and material. Taking the antibiotic
resistance problem as an example, this whitepaper aims to demonstrate the
necessity and feasibility of a Bio-Commons approach. Overuse of the
available antibiotics and subsequent evolutionary pressure has led to the
development of multi-resistant bacteria. Bacteria are under selective
pressure and evolve mechanisms to avoid the antimicrobial effects of the
antibiotics. Once developed, the genes for the resistance rapidly spread,
and even cross over between different species - a process called horizontal
gene transfer. It is therefore necessary to continuously develop new
antibiotics to keep up pace with resistant bacteria. The reason for an
exacerbation of the antibiotics problem into an antibiotics crisis is a
market failure due to a lack of financial incentives for the pharmaceutical
industry to develop new drugs like antibiotics with a small profit margin.
Citizens thought of three possible scenarios of how to detect antibiotic
substances from samples collected in the field. In a citizen science
project dubbed ‘Biostrike’, people around the globe could contribute to the
solution to the antibiotics problem by raising awareness on the issue.
Citizens and Scientists could participate in a global community around
Biostrike, collaborating to find new antibiotics. Specialists from all
fields of expertise could put together their knowledge to build the tool
sets – that is wetware, hardware and software - to enable decentralized
research on antibiotics. The Bio-Commons license could make licensing of
innovation and discovery easier for researchers and thereby stabilize
global collaborations that will help overcome market failure situations as
they exist in antibiotics research. A widely accepted regulatory framework
would be required to provide legal security and reliability as well as
equal, transparent, and fair terms for all participants. Before creating a
legal framework for the Bio-Commons, the social relations and assumptions
underlying an idea of the Bio-Commons need to be addressed. Opening up the
Bio-Commons discussion and introducing democratic decision making will make
everybody a stakeholder. To successfully initiate a broader discussion
about the underlying principles for the Bio-Commons, a mutually
understandable bio-language is needed that adequately describes the
biological reality in digital form. The development of this bio-language in
turn opens the possibility for responsible research and innovation already
at the earliest stages in the development of a new living system. Citizens
also looked for technical solutions and defined a number of requirements
for software to handle the data generated under a Bio-Commons license. It
was thought that the blockchain technology could in future comprise the
technical infrastructure for the Bio-Commons.





Please read the whitepaper and contribute to the development of the idea on
github!

https://github.com/Bio-Commons/Bio-Commons





Best,
Rüdiger
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