On the “Life-Likeness” of Synthetic Cells

One of the most exciting and rapidly expanding research area incontemporary science isthe bottom-up construction of artificial cell-like systems, also known as synthetic cells. Suchapproaches are part of the synthetic biology research paradigm, which equates to understandingmeans constructing. Accordingly, these artificial systemsare considered able to generate newknowledge based on explorative procedures that are complementary to traditional scientificinvestigations. Constructing synthetic cells aims at understanding the emergence of life fromscratch at the cellular level, modeling chemically primitive cells for unveiling origins-of-lifemysteries, and developing radically new biotechnological tools for medical, industrial, and researchapplications. The following article is dedicated to one of the most compelling open questionsemerging from the rapid improvement of synthetic cell technology: “life-likeness” of synthetic cells.Based on prior work, we promote an ‘organizational approach’ to the assessment of life-likeness,and, coherently, we propose the transition from behavioral assays, like the Turing test, to systemicstrategies, based on concepts such as organization, complexity, networks, and emergence.