Do-it-yourself speciation

Abstract Describes how human intervention through genetic engineering can recapitulate the origin of species. Considers the limits to depending on pre-existing genetic variation for creating new species barriers. Fruit flies illustrate how CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing can assist in engineering genetic incompatibilities as synthetic species boundaries. Illustrates how humans can create evolutionary novelty by directing evolution. Uses examples from industrial applications that direct evolution in synthetic vanilla production, synthetic biology construction of microbes that can make proteins with “unnatural” amino acids, and how people might go about giving hen teeth. Begins to outline some of the hazards and limitations of artificial selection and evolutionary engineering.