Dual Use Research on Microbes

Peter Palese is Professor of Microbiology and Chair of the Department of Microbiology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York. He talked about the impact of viral diseases on human health. (Photo: David Carreno Hansen for Volkswagen Foundation)

At the End of each section there was enough time for lively discussions with the speakers (from left: Adel Mahmoud, Princeton University; Marc Lipsitch, Harvard University; Simon Wain-Hobson, Institut Pasteur). (Photo: David Carreno Hansen for Volkswagen Foundation)

The audience consisted of representatives from science, economy, politics, law, and media. (Photo: David Carreno Hansen for Volkswagen Foundation)

The main focus of Adel A. F. Mahmoud’s talk was out on vaccines, their value, use, and still limited knowledge of the underlying biological processes. (Photo: David Carreno Hansen for Volkswagen Foundation)

Cornelius Schmaltz provided an overview of the history, policy, legal framework, and institutional aspects of the EU export control policy in his talk and also discussed the particular case of Ron Fouchier’s publication of his H5N1 influenza research to the audience. (Photo: Philip Bartz for Volkswagen Foundation)

Rüdiger Wolfrum, a professor for law, explained in his talk when the government can impose standards for safe research and restrict the publication of the results of certain research, despite this constitutional guarantee of the freedom of research. (Photo: David Carreno Hansen for Volkswagen Foundation)

André Knottnerus, a Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, spoke about the separate worlds of life sciences and security policy, the impact of 9/11 and the anthrax letters, and an increased awareness as an issue for biomedicine, public health, and academies of science. (Photo: David Carreno Hansen for Volkswagen Foundation)

Michael Specter writes for the New Yorker about science, technology, genetics and public health. He said that everything has dual use: Planes are amazing inventions for transporting people and things but they can also be used as weapons, as happened on September 11th, 2001. He argued that no one in their right mind would want to stop making planes, just because they can be misused as weapons. All we do and should do is trying to make them safer. (Photo: Philip Bartz for Volkswagen Foundation)

Silke Stertz spoke about cellular proteins that the influenza virus uses to enter host cells and how these cellular factors facilitate viral entry. She held her talk together with Benjamin G. Hale. (Photo: Philip Bartz for Volkswagen Foundation)