Issues
Ethical Issues
An important question that rises about this new technique is how it will cause the world to drastically change. It will have a major positive impact on medicine, materials, and electronics, however many problems arise including:
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Scientist have more "god-like" powers since it allows one to assemble any compound that one desires.
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It gives scientist "unprecedented control over matter"
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Self-replication
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"if nanomachines were created to be self replicating and there was a problem with their limiting mechanism, they would multiply endlessly like viruses"
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Potential harmful uses:
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Weapons that attack at a molecular level
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Freedom and Privacy rights problems:
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"people could use molecular sized microphones, cameras, and homing beacons to monitor and track others"
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undetectable surveillance
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Availability:
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Due to high costs, will only be available to the wealthy? Is this fair?
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social issues
Many people are concerned about the health hazards that nanotechnology brings upon society and the environment.
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Safety/health hazards
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Because this technology is still new, there is incomplete knowledge about how nanoparticles can affect human biochemical pathways.
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Although most nanoparticles will prove to be harmless, more research should be conducted in order to "ensure that regulatory agencies can effectively assess the safety of products before they are allowed onto the market".
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Another issue includes how not all income levels are able to afford or have access to DNA Origami products.
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Will this technology cause a bigger gap between the poor and the wealthy?
Legal issues
Because the FDA fears that consumption of nanoparticles may cause health problems, they have passed a law regulating the use of nanotechnology: "FDA will...regulate nanotechnology products under its existing statutory authorities, in accordance with the specific legal standards applicable to each type of product under its jurisdiction."
Technical challanges
Some of the challenges that scientists have faced while researching DNA Origami include:
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high cost of synthetic DNA
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solution may include: "gene synthesis from array-printed DNA" where "small amounts of each of the tens of thousands of unique oligonucleotide sequences are printed at a current price of less than US$0.001 per base".
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high self assembly error rate
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​to expand size and compexity, scientists have attempted to use longer DNA strands and the assembly of pre-formed structures.
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to improve yeild, scientists have imagined "current origami as 'super-tiles' that can be linked together hierarchically to form larger superstructures".
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