Life Sciences and Related Fields Trends Relevant to the Biological Weapons Convention (2011) / Chapter Skim
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3 Diffusion of Life Sciences Research Capacity and Applications
3 Diffusion of Life Sciences Research Capacity and Applications
Pages 59-80
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From page 59... ...
3.1 GLOBAL R&D CAPACITY AND INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATIONS IN SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH 3.1.1 The Growth of International S&T Collaboration The increasingly widespread access and ease of use of communications technologies, combined with the growing availability of resources to support research (see Section 3.1.2) , support the continuing expansion of global research capacity and an ever larger number of international collaborations in science and technology (S&T)
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From page 60... ...
indicate that the number of international collaborations, as measured by jointly authored scientific papers, continues to increase; in 2008 more than one-third of scientific articles included authors from more than one country (Royal Society, 2011b)
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From page 61... ...
. The SNP Consortium links scientists in 11 Asian countries in efforts to catalogue regional human genetic variation, fosters the exchange of knowledge among partner countries, and enables knowledge transfer from more scientifically advanced countries to partner countries seeking to increase their scientific capacity.
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From page 62... ...
: Although health and health-related biotechnology is clearly an area of active international collaboration, it is by no means the only scientific one. IBSA was established in 2003 as a trilateral partnership between the governments of India, Brazil, and South Africa.
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From page 63... ...
, opportunities to bring together complementary types of expertise in "South-South partnerships that synergize strengths and bolster com petitiveness" (Thorsteinsdóttir et al., 2010) , or information sharing by scientifically advanced countries in the South to support capacity building in partner counties (Hassan, 2007)
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From page 64... ...
. For developing countries, one of the key conclusions from the UNESCO Science Report 2010 is worth quoting at length: [T]
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From page 65... ...
Access to Computational and Data Resources As discussed in Chapter 2, the availability of large amounts of data storage capacity and powerful computational resources supports many of the S&T developments surveyed at the workshop, particularly in the omics fields and in systems and synthetic biology (see Section 2.1)
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From page 66... ...
These tools, which can help increase the speed and efficiency of labora tory research, are available to scientists worldwide, although direct com mercial suppliers largely remain clustered in Europe, North America, and parts of Asia. Qualifying Comments: Continuing Limits on Access and Availability Although life sciences research capacity is now globally distributed in a very real sense, a variety of barriers remain for scientists in developing countries (InterAcademy Council, 2004)
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From page 67... ...
A major purpose of this section has been to highlight the increasingly global nature of current life sciences research and the growing role of regional and South-South scientific collaborations, while recognizing that advanced S&T capacity is not yet evenly distributed worldwide. 3.1.3 Discussion and Implications The diffusion of research capacity and its applications is directly rel evant to two articles of the BWC: • Article III, which states: "Each State Party to this Convention undertakes not to transfer to any recipient whatsoever, directly or indirectly, and not in any way to assist, encourage, or induce any State, group of States or international organizations to manufacture or otherwise acquire any of the agents, toxins, weapons, equipment or means of delivery specified in Article I of this Convention." (United Nations, 2011:2)
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From page 68... ...
7 The Chemical Weapons Convention and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty contain similar provisions and debates, but the pervasively dual nature of life sciences research discussed in Chapter 1 makes this problem particularly difficult for the BWC.8 The continuing, rapid diffusion of research capacity and knowledge poses a profound challenge to those aspects of nonproliferation policy that rely on controlling access to knowledge, materials, and technologies. Given that there is little hope of reversing this trend -- and multiple reasons beyond the commitments in Article X to see it as positive and 6 For example, with slightly different wording the Second, Third, Fourth, and Sixth Review Conferences all "noted States Parties should not use the provisions of this Article to impose restrictions and/or limitations on transfers for purposes consistent with the objectives and provisions of the Convention of scientific knowledge, technology, equipment and materials under Article X
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From page 69... ...
3.2 DISEASE SURVEILLANCE AND RESPONSE SYSTEMS: A RESEARCH AREA THAT EXEMPLIFIES GLOBAL LIFE SCIENCES CAPACITY AND INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION RELEVANT TO THE BWC 3.2.1 Introduction In 2007 the World Health Report from the World Health Organization (WHO) warned Today's highly mobile, interdependent and interconnected world pro vides myriad opportunities for the rapid spread of infectious diseases … Infectious diseases are now spreading geographically much faster than at any time in history.
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From page 70... ...
. Although the BSE case was not due to a biological weapons attack and many markets gradually reopened, the potential economic 10 Prevention for human, animal, or plant health, for example, is distinct from the range of other political, military, and technical measures that States Parties may take to prevent an intentional biological attack.
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From page 71... ...
. 13 An initiative from the nongovernmental community that preceded -- and served as a model for -- current intergovernmental efforts, the International Society for Infectious Diseases operates ProMed-mail, which provides reports on emerging infectious disease outbreaks online as well as through an email listserv and also operates region-specific notifications for areas such as Africa, the former Soviet Union, and Southeast Asia (http:// www.promedmail.org/)
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From page 72... ...
In 2004, the focus was "strengthening and broadening na tional and international institutional efforts and existing mechanisms for the surveillance, detection, diagnosis and combating of infectious diseases affecting humans, animals, and plants; and in 2009 it was enhancing international cooperation, assistance and exchange in biological sciences and technology for peaceful purposes, promoting capacity building in the fields of disease surveillance, detection, diagnosis, and containment of infectious diseases: (1) for States Parties in need of assistance, identifying requirements and requests for capacity enhancement; and (2)
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From page 73... ...
A closely related field, bioforensics, which uses scientific tools to help identify the origin of a particular pathogen and thus has the potential to support the investigation of natural disease outbreaks or potential bioweapons incidents as well as to contribute to the global network of national and international public health disease surveillance labs, is discussed in the next section. The increased attention to global health security has included a significant expansion of laboratory capacity in many parts of the world, in part to support research and in part to enable identification of outbreaks close to the source.
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From page 74... ...
National Strategy for Countering Biological Threats (White House, 2009a) and the programs to implement it, the European Commission's CBRN Centres of Excellence, and the G8 Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction.20 17 The most recent edition of the Biosafety in Microbiological and Biomedical Laboratories from the U.S.
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From page 75... ...
In the area of animal diseases, a very recent global initiative may contribute to the research capacity to better understand some of these diseases. The Global Strategic Alliances for the Coordination of Research on the Major Infectious Diseases of Animals and Zoonoses (STAR-IDAZ)
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From page 76... ...
However, these multiple tools can provide a network of complementary support including general detection or rapid screening to flag a likely outbreak, specific diagnosis and more detailed characterization of the pathogen, and potential treatments that can be deployed to protect at-risk populations. Global travel and trade and the potential commercial as well as health implications of disease outbreaks highlight vulnerabilities in the system and also emphasize the important role of international cooperation in disease monitoring and response.
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From page 77... ...
• What science has yet to be developed to distinguish among natu ral, deliberate, and unintentional outbreaks, and how can the time to doing so be reduced? In addition to supporting investigations of alleged hostile uses of biological agents, advances in technology to support microbial forensics could be potentially applied to further the development of biosurveillance and detection systems.
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From page 78... ...
. Reflecting the growing global participation, the 2011 competition will begin with 21 The Registry of Standard Biological Parts, used by the iGEM competition, is available online, as "part of the Synthetic Biology community's efforts to make biology easier to en gineer" (http://partsregistry.org/)
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From page 79... ...
government regulatory frameworks, which is the typical province of the BWC? 3.4.3 Discussion and Implications Improving the understanding of and excitement for life sciences among the public can be seen as advantageous, because scientific research relies on public trust and public funding and because policies to address a range of issues require public engagement.
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From page 80... ...
The potential for intentional misuse of research results is also addressed. The website includes references to the BWC as the key international legal agreement and to resources related to responsible conduct as well as national guidelines and regulations.24 Dr.
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