The prospects are tantalizing — and terrifying:

The first life form created entirely with man-made DNA opens the door to manufacturing new drugs and fuels, while raising the possibility that mail-order germs may one-day be available for bioterrorists.

Researchers at the J. Craig Venter Institute in Rockville, Maryland, reported today in the journal Science that for the first time, they made a copy of a bacterium’s entire genome and then transplanted it into a related organism, where it functioned normally.

The culmination of 15 years of effort, the work provides a blueprint for making organisms that could be used to make better fuels, drugs, vaccines and sources of food, the institute’s researchers said in a statement. It also suggests that companies that can manufacture DNA should stay on guard, said James Collins, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute-supported bioengineer at Boston University, in a telephone interview.

“They sent out chunks of the genetic code to companies and asked them each to synthesize parts of it,” Collins said. “You don’t want bad guys to order 10 parts of a nasty virus from 10 different groups and then put them together.”

Even so, lawmakers and the public can’t afford to turn away from this rapidly evolving technology, which holds both peril and promise, said Arthur Caplan, a University of Pennsylvania bioethicist, in a commentary written for msnbc.com today.

“The regulatory, social and legal challenges can be solved,” he said in the commentary. “It will take both national and international commitments to do so, but the risk of inaction is greater than the risks of moving forward given the tremendous benefits this technology promises.”

Read more at the link.

UPDATE:  The Catholic Church has now weighed in:

Catholic Church officials said Friday the recent creation by researchers of the first synthetic cell can be a positive development if correctly used, but warned scientists that only God can create life.

Vatican and Italian church officials were mostly cautious in their first reaction to the announcement from the United States that researchers had produced a living cell powered by manmade DNA. They warned scientists of the ethical responsibility of scientific progress and said that the manner in which the innovation is applied in the future will be crucial.

“If it is used toward the good, to treat pathologies, we can only be positive” in our assessment, Monsignor Rino Fisichella, the Vatican’s top bioethics official, told state-run TV. “If it turns out not to be … useful to respect the dignity of the person, then our judgment would change.”

“We look at science with great interest. But we think above all about the meaning that must be given to life,” said Fisichella, who heads Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life. “We can only reach the conclusion that we need God, the origin of life.”