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control wild populations by a modification of their genotype and accordingly engineer ecosystems by the conversion or suppression of wild populations. With the potentially increased power and range of GDMO in comparison with GMO many open questions arise regarding effects, control and reversibility. In particular actively replicating drives based on homing endonuclease genes (e.g., CRISPR/Cas9) are probably highly invasive and may thus be not confineable to a target population. Hence, there is an urgent demand for a prospective analysis of impact, side effects, countermeasures and the feasibility of low-risk approaches. An early analysis of gene drive technologies as well as affected systems by prospective technology assessment and a vulnerability analysis of potentially exposed systems may give indications for critical functionalities of the technology and weak elements of the surrounding environment. As with most areas of technoscience, basic research and application- oriented alignment are closely related and difficult to separate. Therefore, if there is evidence for low risk development paths, these improvements should be considered and implemented early in the development of new drive systems. Given the high potential of gene drives as a new stage in genetic engineering, a public discussion on potential risks and benefits as in the advent of genetic engineering and first releases of GMO is still missing1. Nonetheless a broad debate is urgently needed to clarify the issues associated with the use of gene drives. Their range and their potential consequences are too significant to remain disregarded. References Burt, Austin. 2003. “Site-Specific Selfish Genes as Tools for the Control and Genetic Engineering of Natural Populations.” Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 270 (1518): 921–28. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2002.2319. Burt, Austin, Mamadou Coulibaly, Andrea Crisanti, Abdoulaye Diabate, and Jonathan K. Kayondo. 2018. “Gene Drive to Reduce Malaria Transmission in Sub-Saharan Africa.” Journal of Responsible Innovation 5 (sup1): S66–80. https://doi.org/10.1080/23299460.2017.1419410. Callaway, Ewen. 2017. “Gene Drives Meet the Resistance.” Nature 542: 15. https://doi.org/ 10.1038/542015a. Champer, Jackson, Anna Buchman, and Omar S. Akbari. 2016. “Cheating Evolution: Engineering Gene Drives to Manipulate the Fate of Wild Populations.” Nature Reviews Genetics 17 (3): 146–59. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrg.2015.34. Courtier‐Orgogozo, Virginie, Baptiste Morizot, and Christophe Boëte. 2017a. “Agricultural Pest Control with CRISPR‐based Gene Drive: Time for Public Debate: Should We Use Gene Drive for Pest Control?” EMBO Reports, May, e201744205. https://doi.org/10.15252/embr.201744205. ———. 2017b. “Using CRISPR‐based Gene Drive for Agriculture Pest Control.” EMBO Reports, August, e201744822. https://doi.org/10.15252/embr.201744822. David, Aaron S., Joe M. Kaser, Amy C. Morey, Alexander M. Roth, and David A. Andow. 2013. “Release of Genetically Engineered Insects: A Framework to Identify Potential Ecological Effects.” Ecology and Evolution 3 (11): 4000–4015. https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.737. 1 Cp. the STS proceedings-paper “A world without mosquitos?” of Julia Diekämper for a survey of newspaper articles on genome editing and gene drives. (cf. S. 90) 87