Pointers - 11 July 2009

Nature blogs on concerns over the public acceptance of synthetic biology at the recent Washington DC conference organised by the OECD. And whether the technology needs a new name, like "shiny, happy biology". The blog post doesn't mention it but Drew Endy was referring to a joke made at the SB 2.0 conference in 2006 over whether "synthetic biology" was the right name.

Local news for Bostonians on an MIT competition for clean energy. Cambridge, MA-based InAct Labs, which is working on microbial fuel cells, is one of the semi-finalists.