The first artificial - synthetic- lifeform is likely to be a simple man-made bacterium that proves that the technology can work
Researchers successfully transferred the DNA of one type of bacteria into a yeast cell, modified it and then transferred it into another bacterial cell. The pioneering 'gene swap' was performed on a simple species of bacteria called Mycoplasma mycoide
The team successfully transplanted the genome of one bacteria into another for the first time in 2007. They then created the first entirely man-made genome. But previous attempts to introduce the synthetic genome into another organism and take control of the new bacteria all failed
