The US scientist J. Craig Venter said for the British newspaper The Guardian that he has built a synthetic chromosome out of laboratory chemicals, a move that might lead to the creation of the first new artificial life form.

This landmark would be "a very important philosophical step in the history of our species. We are going from reading our genetic code to the ability to write it. That gives us the hypothetical ability to do things never contemplated before" J. Craig Venter said for The Guardian.

Venter and his team of scientists have created a chromosome based on the bacterium Mycoplasma genitalium is 381 genes long and contains 580,000 base pairs of genetic code. The synthetic chromosome was named Mycoplasma laboratorium.

The next step of the process is to insert the synthetic chromosome into a living cell where Mycoplama laboratorium should “take control” and become a new life form.

According to The Guardian, Venter and his team have already managed to transplant the genome of one type of bacterium into the cell of another. In June this year the scientists from Venter institute transplanted chromosomes to change the bacterial species Mycoplasma capricolum into Mycoplasma mycoides Large Colony (LC).

Venter is confident that the technique would work for the synthetic chromosome and he could announce the results of his work within a few weeks, The Guardian noted.

But if J. Craig Venter has indeed solved the problem of creating artificial life this could trigger a huge ethical debate, especially since Venter is already controversial for his role in the study of the human genome. Also, he applied for a patent for the synthetic bacterium, which means that he could become the only person to control how his discovery will be used.

Venter said the synthetic chromosome has a positive potential, as it can be used to create new energy sources and techniques to combat global warming. Also, this breakthrough could lead to the creation of new drugs.  But the artificially-created bacteria could be used also as biological weapons.

Though, a Venter spokesman said for AFP that The Guardian “is ahead of themselves on this”. "We have not achieved what some have speculated we have in synthetic life”, she added.