Redesigning Life. That was what Steven Benner wanted to call his 1988 conference in Interlaken, Switzerland. A chemist now at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Benner was organizing the meeting to explore the possibilities for making artificial chemical systems that mimic essential features of living things. But his title caused such a furore among prospective attendees that Benner had to tone it down to Redesigning the Molecules of Life. "Individuals as distinguished as Nobel laureates were convinced that the title would incite anti-recombinant-DNA riots in Switzerland," Benner explains.
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