From Astral Codex Ten: Defying Cavity: Lantern Bioworks FAQ
Lantern Bioworks says they have a cure for tooth decay. Their product is a genetically modified bacterium which infects your mouth, outcompetes all the tooth-decay-causing bacteria, and doesn’t cause tooth decay itself. If it works, it could make cavities a thing of the past (you should still brush for backup and cosmetic reasons).
I talked to Lantern founder Aaron Silverbook to get an idea of how this works, both in a biological and an economic sense. Aaron was very knowledgeable and forthcoming, although he uses the phrase “YOLO” somewhat more often than most biotech founders. This post isn’t a verbatim interview transcript, just a writeup of what I learned based on his answers.
[Conflict of interest notice: Lantern is mostly rationalists and includes some friends. My wife consulted for them early on. They offered my wife and I free samples (based on her work, not as compensation for writing this post); she accepted, and I’m still debating. Consider this an attempt to spotlight interesting work that people I like are doing, not a hard-hitting investigation.]
1: What is BCS3-L1?
BCS3-L1 (brand name “Lumina”) is a genetically-modified strain of the tooth decay bacterium, streptococcus mutans.
S. mutans lives on your teeth and metabolizes any spare sugar that comes its way into the waste product lactic acid. If too much s. mutans gets together in one place, all the lactic acid dissolves the tooth’s enamel coating, causing cavities.
BCS3-LI has four genetic modifications:
- It produces a weak antibiotic, mutacin-1140, which kills competing oral bacteria.
- It’s immune to mutacin-1140, so it doesn’t kill itself.
- It metabolizes sugar through a different chemical pathway that ends in alcohol instead of lactic acid.
- It lacks a peptide its species usually uses to arrange gene transfers with other bacteria.
The antibiotic helps it win the Darwinian competition in your mouth to become King Of The Oral Bacteria. The alcohol metabolism means it won’t produce lactic acid (and so won’t cause tooth decay). The peptide knockout prevents it from transferring genes back and forth with other bacteria that might either inactivate it or leak its advantage.
In somewhat related news (that is even better): FDA approves cure for sickle cell disease, the first treatment to use gene-editing tool CRISPRReport
This guy is going to be so disappointed when the FDA does not say “oh wow, that’s a great product! It’s so great that we’re just gonna skip your review and approve your thing for use in humans right away.”Report
There is going to be one hell of a black market in this.
You just need to know a guy who knows a guy. And then make out with him.Report
Well, “bleeding-edge medical technology that no government would ever approve is available, for a price, although be aware it might actually kill you” is a big part of the #cyberpunkfuture…Report
Eh, “this occurs naturally in nature including in *SOME* humans… we’re just making it available to everyone!” is a narrative that will allow many to say “No, that’s *SOLARPUNK*!”Report
“To move beyond the demographic of people willing to fly to Prospera and pay $20,000, Lantern will need FDA permission. The FDA has already set unreachable standards for any drug approval study, so Aaron wants to try a different route.
The FDA has lower standards for probiotics than for drugs. And technically, a bacterium which you take in order to change your natural microbiome is a probiotic.”
Not saying it’s gonna work, but they’re not unaware of the hurdle.Report
YOLO.Report
Oh, he figures he’s gonna pull an Uber and redefine his product to “get around” the FDA? Good luck with that one bro!Report