Mirror bacteria and microbes are synthetic lifeforms made to reflect existing life on Earth. They could serve as tools to treat diseases, but some scientists are concerned about potentially catastrophic public health consequences.
"Mirror molecules could be turned into therapies for chronic and hard-to-treat diseases, while mirror microbes could make bioproduction facilities, which use bugs to churn out chemicals, more resistant to contamination," said The Guardian. Researchers are interested in their use to create long-acting drugs for diseases like HIV and Alzheimer's. "It's inherently incredibly cool," Kate Adamala, a synthetic biologist at the University of Minnesota, said to The New York Times. "If we made a mirror cell, we would have made a second tree of life."
Despite potential positive applications, mirror bacteria have "unprecedented and largely overlooked risks," said a report published in the journal Science. This is because "immune systems rely on recognizing specific molecular shapes found in invading bacteria," said CNN. If these shapes were inverted, "recognition would be impaired and immune defenses could fail, potentially leaving organisms vulnerable to infection." The infections caused by mirror bacteria could be lethal, and the mirror bacteria themselves could even be considered an invasive species.
If research to develop mirror bacteria is not halted, countermeasures can be taken, including "studying the interaction of mirror biomolecules with the immune system as well as developing detection methods and biosurveillance systems," said the Science report. "Although countermeasures could not prevent widespread harm, they might offer some limited or localized protection." | 
