I just wanted to open a discussion thread on synthetic organisms. An article was just put out in the NYT describing Craig Venter's new work.
Here is a link
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/24/science/24cnd-genome.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

I haven't found the link to the new paper reported, but I will post it when it comes out.

Omai