The impact of synthetic biology

Synthetic biology has recently been at the center of the world's attention as a new scientific and engineering discipline. It allows us to design and construct finely controllable metabolic and regulatory pathways, circuits, and networks, as well as create new enzymes, pathways, and even whole cells. With this great power of synthetic biology, we can develop new organisms that can efficiently produce new drugs to benefit human healthcare and superperforming microorganisms capable of producing chemicals, fuels, and materials from renewable biomass, without the use of fossil oil. Based on several successful examples reported, this commentary aims at peeking into the potential of synthetic biology.