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This exclusive Cogs of War interview is with Diane DiEuliis, a distinguished research fellow at National Defense University focused on emerging biological technologies, biodefense, and preparedness for biothreats. As biotech is increasingly important to defense, we asked her to share her thoughts on the industry and its future.

There are so many theoretical enhancements that biotech can deliver to warfighters — from wearable exoskeletons that can carry hundreds of extra pounds, to eye implants that can sharpen night vision. Which are most likely to be adopted first?

In the near term, the kinds of advancements that give an incremental “boost” to everyday skills will be more readily adopted. To physically perform better, to be faster or stronger for longer time periods, or in austere conditions, are warfighter needs that have been pursued before today’s biotechnology. The most readily adopted biotech will be for these incremental improvements in physical performance. “Cyborg Soldier 2050” focused on this topic directly, and noted that more complex human applications, such as those involving cognitive enhancement, learning, or behavior, will take longer — not only to develop them safely and securely, but to ensure their ethical use.

Depictions of biotech in war are common in science fiction books and movies. Biotech is usually shown in a couple of different ways: as a force multiplier for soldiers, a strategic commodity that states try to control, a weapon, or, most radically, a way to engineer military obedience. Which of these ways of thinking about biotech and the future of war will be most accurate in the next 10 years? What about the next 50?

This is an inherent challenge with biotechnology: It crosses so many sectors and potential applications, from medical countermeasures to bioengineering for biomanufacturing to human enhancement.

Because of the potential power of biotech, we are already in a race for global leadership in the bioeconomy. I believe the next 10 years will be focused on global bioeconomic competition to produce high-value commodities, in the traditional sectors of medicine and agriculture, but increasingly in new sectors like energetics, materials, or textiles. This critically relies on complex data (we call it biodata) that underlies the functional biotechnological knowledge base.

But beyond biomanufacturing, biotech advances are moving into uncharted territory. For example, we have recently seen a type of recreation of an extinct species of Dire Wolf — the stuff that sci-fi movies are made of. Biotechnology could certainly be misused, and in 50 years, we may realize more advances that profoundly affect our environment or humans directly. And we need to think about the implications of this now, rather than waiting for it to happen.

The biotech and defense tech industries are both highly capital-intensive industries tightly regulated by the government. What’s something you think the commercial biotech industry does well that defense tech industries should try to replicate, and vice versa? How can the Department of Defense work with biotech companies to fully take advantage of biotechnology applications? Is it already happening?

When I first wrote about biotechnology modernization back in 2018, I talked about emerging biotechnology innovations and the need for a strategy to best leverage these innovations for the Defense Department. At that time, the challenges were internal coordination, engaging a private sector that typically didn’t work with the Defense, and determining what, across the myriad of possibilities, to prioritize. Much has been accomplished since then.

Yet a clear ongoing challenge for the Defense Department has been how to engage with the synthetic biology industry that is fast-paced, innovative, and focused on the civilian marketplace for profit. Successful civilian applications can be adopted for warfighter use, but some will need to be bespoke for defense. For example, the Air Force is developing bio-cement for runways, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is supporting research on how it can be used to shore up deteriorating infrastructure on military installations. But it could offer advantages for everyday construction of homes or industrial buildings, like improved durability and fire resistance.

Products that serve specific defense needs, such as bio-manufactured chemicals for munitions, are being piloted as well. Time will tell whether these innovations are successful, both in how well they perform and whether they are cost-effective. The competition for diminishing resources is also going to be something the United States will need to win, and that is clearly tied to national security needs. Rare earth metals are just one example, and biotechnology is creating engineered microbes that can isolate them. Overall, the current defense investments in fermentation and other biomanufacturing standards and scaling will help the broader U.S. bioeconomy grow by helping biomanufacturing platforms become reliable, sustainable, and more cost-effective.

I should also mention that the Defense Department is developing more flexible ways of funding novel technologies, and the administration, as well as Congress, are interested in acquisition reforms that could help biotech.

The House and Senate versions of the National Defense Authorization Act include some exciting provisions for biotech. What is the most promising provision? What do you feel was left out?

I was excited to see these biotechnology provisions, which incorporate needs that have been highlighted for a while now, and include some that are very well-articulated in the recent report of the National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology.  The most important aspect is that Congress has recognized biotechnology as a strategic capability with impacts on the future of US national security, and they are requiring the programmatic infrastructure to support it. This includes a management office and the development of a “bioliterate” workforce, or people trained to work in domestic biotechnological supply chains.

I agree with requiring a defense-wide strategy. While an initial strategy was created to stand up programs quickly, biotech could be more strategically integrated across the Department — particularly when there are multiple emerging technologies in addition to biotech that Defense wants to leverage. We should still be asking which problems are best solved by biotechnology, versus other technologies or approaches. The strategy should be dynamic over time to continuously evaluate outcomes, and work with other departments like the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation, which are making investments in data and artificial intelligence that can drive biotech.

The requirement for ethical guidelines, consent, and environmental risk assessment is absolutely critical — but I would have also liked to see the inclusion of risk assessment from an operational perspective. What are the vulnerabilities inherent in using biotech that an adversary could take advantage of? If we deploy biotechnology sensors into the environment, what signatures might they inadvertently create that can be detected or defeated by the adversary? These kinds of questions should be part of our strategic thinking.

I have always liked the idea of using the bio-economy to bring manufacturing and jobs back to the United States. I’d further ask how defense can be strategic in using regional strengths across the country. The Midwest has farms for feedstocks, the Northeast has pharma and innovation, the Southeast has a strong biotech workforce, and the West Coast has biofoundries, venture capital, and start-ups. How can existing or abandoned manufacturing facilities in the Rust Belt be repurposed for biotechnology? In Philadelphia, an old steel mill that was originally built to make tanks for World War II is now a certified biomanufacturing hub. Although not funded by the Defense Department, it represents a success story that could be emulated elsewhere.

In 2020, the Defense Department stood up BioMade, a Manufacturing USA initiative that aims to grow bioindustrial manufacturing and reduce barriers to its adoption across the country. What are your thoughts about BioMade’s progress to date and within broader defense efforts? 

The Defense Department is leading government investment in biomanufacturing, with the expectation that this will drive the broader U.S. bioeconomy by default. I see BioMade as part of that, as one of several bio-focused Manufacturing USA facilities. BioMade is making strides through collaboration, convening start-ups with industry partners, and exploring scale-up tools and standards. Yet there are still challenges that I hope they can resolve as the field matures.

Bio-manufactured products still struggle to compete as they can be more expensive to produce than those made from petroleum manufacturing, especially when scaling up. Efficient scaling is still hampered by low yield rates, high feedstock costs, and the need for specialized equipment. Bio-based products also face challenges to adoption in the mass marketplace and can face regulatory hurdles in some markets. The approval process for bio-based chemicals, fuels, or materials, while improving, can be time-consuming, and there is a need for clear standards and certifications to foster industry-wide acceptance. An additional future challenge will be the disparate pathways between “bespoke” types of small-scale applications, versus large-scale defense products that must be demonstrated to perform as well, or better, than existing ones.

What’s one misconception about biotechnology you wish you could clarify for defense practitioners?

Warfighter health and chemical and biological defense countermeasures have been primary areas of focus for biotechnology. Emerging biotechnology should be leveraged to advance these, and the first-ever Biodefense Posture Review highlights this. But some practitioners may not be aware of the capabilities that biotech might provide in other areas, like materials and sensors.

We also need to temper our enthusiasm with a dose of reality. We are in the “hype cycle” for biotech, and not everything that we imagine will (or maybe should) come true. It makes our strategic choices now even more important, and a primary question for the Defense Department should be, when, and how, biotech is considered to be “modernized.”

What development in dual-use biotech concerns you the most?

Another great question – a few years ago, I was part of a study entitled “Biodefense in the Age of Biotechnology,” and I think that the dual-use risks highlighted there are still very relevant. I’ve been discussing here how biomanufacturing can make high-value chemical products at scale, and so it stands that the same advances could be used to make harmful chemicals. Extinct or existing pathogens could be recreated or made more harmful. Bioengineering can alter organisms for beneficial use, but it can also enable the creation agents for harm — and precision medicine can make ‘precision maladies’. Engineered microbiomes, for example, could readily afford that.

I also worry about putting unknowns into the environment without understanding their impact on ecosystems. We have been worried about all these possibilities for some time now, and we need to continue to ensure our biodefense capabilities keep pace with these threats.

That said, a game-changer today is the advent of artificial intelligence — its intersection with biotechnology puts the tools of biotechnology in the hands of more actors. This isn’t limited to information risks in large language models but extends to protein design engineering and automated cloud labs, which can predict, design, and carry out experimentation. This can also enable the creation of non-natural, or truly “synthetic” biological entities whose properties we may not fully understand.

Biotechnology is rapidly becoming a “foundational” technology — it can enable industries across multiple sectors and shape long-term economic and security competitiveness. It will be up to all of us to ensure we harness the benefits while making it as secure as possible.

Diane DiEuliis, PhD, is a distinguished research fellow at National Defense University, where she studies the impacts of emerging biotechnologies on biodefense and the warfighter. Specific areas under her research portfolio include dual-use life sciences research, the U.S. bioeconomy, neurotechnologies, and scientific collections. She worked as the Assistant Director for Life Sciences and Behavioral and Social Sciences in the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President across several administrations and completed her postdoctoral research at the National Institutes of Health. She holds a PhD in Biology from the University of Delaware.

The views and opinions expressed in this interview are her own, and do not reflect those of the United States government, Department of Defense, or National Defense University.

Image: Midjourney