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Synthetic biology in the view of European public funding organisations

Authors :
Lei Pei
Sibylle Gaisser
Markus Schmidt
Source :
Public Understanding of Science (Bristol, England)
Publication Year :
2012
Publisher :
SAGE Publications, 2012.

Abstract

We analysed the decisions of major European public funding organisations to fund or not to fund synthetic biology (SB) and related ethical, legal and social implication (ELSI) studies. We investigated the reaction of public organisations in six countries (Austria, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the UK) towards SB that may influence SB’s further development in Europe. We examined R&D and ELSI communities and their particular funding situation. Our results show that the funding situation for SB varies considerably among the analysed countries, with the UK as the only country with an established funding scheme for R&D and ELSI that successfully integrates these research communities. Elsewhere, we determined a general lack of funding (France), difficulties in funding ELSI work (Switzerland), lack of an R&D community (Austria), too small ELSI communities (France, Switzerland, Netherlands), or difficulties in linking existing communities with available funding sources (Germany), partly due to an unclear SB definition.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
13616609 and 09636625
Volume :
21
Issue :
2
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
Public Understanding of Science (Bristol, England)
Accession number :
edsair.doi.dedup.....19138aac4bd85671c8fcb5f4c2bd6d54