Scientists Create Cell Assembly Line: New Technology Synthesizes Cellular Structures from Simple Starting Materials (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110303184121.htm)
QuoteScienceDaily (Mar. 4, 2011) â€" Borrowing a page from modern manufacturing, scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute have built a microscopic assembly line that mass produces synthetic cell-like compartments.
The new computer-controlled system represents a technological leap forward in the race to create the complex membrane structures of biological cells from simple chemical starting materials.
"Biology is full of synthetic targets that have inspired chemists for more than a century," said Brian Paegel, Scripps Research assistant professor and lead author of a new study published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. "The lipid membrane assemblies of cells and their organelles pose a daunting challenge to the chemist who wants to synthesize these structures with the same rational approaches used in the preparation of small molecules."...
Once you have a container you have somewhere to put anything you can dream up that you can make. The Cylons are born.