In decision 15/31, the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity established a process for broad and regular horizon scanning, monitoring and assessment of the most recent developments in synthetic biology. In the same decision, the Conference of the Parties established a multidisciplinary Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on Synthetic Biology to support the process.
The multidisciplinary Expert Group held its first meeting in July 2023 and agreed on a process for the first cycle of broad and regular horizon scanning, monitoring and assessment of the most recent technological developments in synthetic biology. This process consists of expert-driven submissions by members of the multidisciplinary Expert Group and a literature review conducted by the Secretariat. The process can be found in Annex I of the report of the meeting of the multidisciplinary Expert Group: CBD/SYNBIO/AHTEG/2023/1/3.
Accordingly, the Secretariat has conducted a literature review based on a revised list of trends and issues in synthetic biology, which were based on the 2019 report of the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on Synthetic Biology, the Open-ended Online Forum on Synthetic Biology, the submissions of information and the publication “Technical Series No. 100: Synthetic Biology”. The draft literature review was made available on 16 January 2024 and underwent a peer review process from 16 January to 15 February 2024 (notification 2024-003). A final version of the literature review was made available as document CBD/SBSTTA/26/INF/5.
Supplementary data: Supplemental data analysis (temporal-geographic-collaboration-patent).xlsx
Extracted data for the 55 trends and issues in synthetic biology: https://www.cbd.int/synbio/55%20trends%20and%20issues%20-%20data%20extraction%20spreadsheets.zip
Peer review comments received can be accessed on the Biosafety Clearing-House.
Author's responses to peer review comments: May 2024-Compilation of Peer Review Comments.xlsx
This literature review aims to quantify the trends and issues in synthetic biology during the period 2012–2023. It can be seen as complementary to broad and regular horizon scanning, monitoring and assessment of the most recent technological developments in synthetic biology.
