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  • ESSAY

Money and murder: the dark side of the Asilomar meeting on recombinant DNA

The famed 1975 conference about a controversial genetic technology is feted as an example of how scientific self-regulation works. But more significant is what wasn’t discussed.
By
  1. Matthew Cobb

    1. Matthew Cobb is professor emeritus at the University of Manchester, UK, and author of The Genetic Age (Profile Books, 2022).

Three middle age men and one woman with sun glasses are sitting and discussing at a conference. A blackboard is in the background.

Biologists Maxine Singer, Norton Zinder, Sydney Brenner and Paul Berg at Asilomar in 1975. Credit: Album/Alamy

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On 24 February 1975, some 150 people met at the Asilomar Conference Grounds near Monterey on the Californian coast. They were mostly scientists from the United States, together with representatives of various companies and government agencies, and 16 journalists. Their subject was the new technology of recombinant DNA — molecules created in a laboratory by stitching together genetic material from different organisms. Researchers were excited by the possibilities for discoveries, and the potential of the technique to produce drugs, for example using specially engineered bacteria to make insulin. But they were also terrified that they might inadvertently create diseases that could infect lab workers and the wider community.

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Nature 638, 603-606 (2025)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-025-00457-w

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Competing Interests

The author declares no competing interests,

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