The first functional synthetic genome is constructed, rebuilding a virus from scratch - in two weeks. Decoded: these guys synthesized viral DNA from scratch, inserted it into a cell, and the DNA used the cell to start constructing virii.
Read the press release, it's much better than the article.
What's the point of this? as the cost of synthesizing genomes drop, it becomes cheaper and cheaper to search genome space for sequences of DNA that result in organisms or organismal components with functions we find valuable - waste eaters, plaque removers, energy producers.