if they create just the minimal genome necessary for life, is this bacteria 'just getting by'? i mean, if you start telling it to do something really energetically expensive ... like chew up a pollutant that it isn't using for fuel ... won't you need to tinker with other areas of the minimal genome to make metabolic space?

Hi

I actually wrote a post about this as well. I don't add very much relative to what you wrote aside from a brief critique on the press releases which describe this as a step toward creating "artificial life". However, feel free to take a look at:

http://omnomescience.blogspot.co...-swap- meet.html

I don't know that a minimal genome would imply an organism existing on some sort of metabolic knife-edge. Lack of adaptability, now that I could believe. I'd expect that as long as you maintained your tailored organism in an environment to its liking it could have spare energy to burn...