A new revolution?

Systems biology and synthetic biology have emerged at the dawn of the twenty-first century as two new research fields that hold much promise for both understanding living systems and novel practical applications. The two disciplines have much in common, not least that the scientists working within their respective frameworks share the conviction that organisms are made of partially independent functional modules that are organized in networks. However, whereas systems biology aims to describe this modular organization, synthetic biology is geared towards more practical developments. My aim here is to localize these new disciplines in the changing landscape of biological disciplines using three successive strategies. First, I compare the rise of these new disciplines with the development of molecular biology during the 1950s and ask whether we are now observing a similar transformation of biology. Second, I question the epistemological novelty of these two disciplines and ask whether they introduce new ways to lead research projects in biology. Third, I consider the role that these disciplines play, or might play, in the encounter between functional biology and evolutionary biology, which is one of the major transformations that is currently affecting the life sciences.