Yeasty politics and entanglements with humans in synthetic biology

Keywords: yeast, synthetic biology, biopolitics, STS, more-than-human geographies
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Saturday
Session Start / End Time: 2/26/2022 08:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/26/2022 09:20 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 1

Abstract

For millennia, humans and yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) have coproduced a diverse array of fermented comestibles. (Money 2018). Recently, synthetic biologists have taken an acute interest in yeast’s potential to act as a “model organism” for cutting-edge genomic research (Dymond & Boeke 2012). Those working “with” or “on” yeast in laboratory settings often apply engineering and design principles to elicit desirable genetic outcomes from yeasty bodies. At the same time, scientists recognize yeast’s vitality and “personality” in their work (Calvert & Szymanski 2020). Yeast’s agential status in laboratory assemblages raises questions about intellectual property and commodification, while presenting opportunities for considering legal and ethical landscapes of whole-genome engineering alongside the “microbial turn” in the social sciences (Paxson & Helmreich 2014; Szymanski 2018). Despite yeast’s inability to “speak” for itself in a conventional sense, its importance to humans invites us to consider more creative, alternative approaches to governance.
This study draws upon interviews, textual analysis, and observation of scientists working with yeast to interrogate the (bio)politics and territories of yeast-human interactions in synthetic biology. It seeks to further develop productive conceptualizations of multispecies entanglements, particularly in cases where the nonhuman other is less perceivable. Preliminary results gesture away from totalizing narratives that portray yeast as either completely passive or autonomous, instead exploring more contingent relationships in which spatial context matters. Drawing upon scholarship in political ecology, science and technology studies, and more-than-human geographies, this work seeks to develop a politics of yeast in laboratory spaces.