Biotechnology and Biochemical Weapons

The toxicology of bioregulators as potential agents of bioterrorism.

Bioregulators or modulators are biochemical compounds such as peptides, that occur naturally in organisms. Advances in biotechnology create the potential for the misuse of peptide bioregulators in offensive biological weapons programmes. Bioregulators are a new class of weapons that can damage the nervous system, alter mood, trigger psychological changes and kill. Over the last twenty years, ne...

Genetic engineering and biological weapons

©2003 EUROPEAN MOLECULAR BIOLOGY ORGANIZATION EMBO reports VOL 4 | special issue | 2003 S57 Rapid developments in biotechnology, genetics and genomics are undoubtedly creating a variety of environmental, ethical, political and social challenges for advanced societies. But they also have severe implications for international peace and security because they open up tremendous avenues for the crea...

Science and prohibited weapons.

T his year, on 17 June, the Geneva Protocol, an international treaty prohibiting the use of asphyxiating or poisonous gases and bacteriological methods of warfare, turned 80 years of age. It was fostered in part by a 1918 appeal in which the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) described the use of poisonous gas against soldiers as a " barbarous invention which science is bringing to...

Threats to the common good. Biochemical weapons and human subjects research.

Management of natural and bioterrorism induced pandemics.

A recent approach for bioterrorism risk management calls for stricter regulations over biotechnology as a way to control subversion of technology that may be used to create a man-made pandemic. This approach is largely unworkable given the increasing pervasiveness of molecular techniques and tools throughout society. Emerging technology has provided the tools to design much deadlier pathogens b...