Synthetic Biology v.0.1

Before there were genomes, DNA, or confocal microscopes, there were dudes doing synthetic biology in France. Despite what almost every single paper on synthetic biology says, the term was actually coined in the early 20th century by Stéphane Leduc, who spent all of his time mixing together various salts and chemicals and seeing how osmosis (left) could mimic the properties of "real life" (right). Maybe in 100 years when everyone knows better they will ignore our treatises as well.