Urgent warning issued leading scientists for one “unprecedented” danger posed by laboratory experiments that could wipe out humanity.

It is about the “bacteria-mirrors” or “mirror life” which are synthetic organisms that are made from mirrored versions of molecules found in nature.

If they escaped from the lab, there would be nothing to stop them from settling in the wild and threatening plants, animals and people with deadly infections.

A group of 38 Nobel laureates and other experts who have tried to create ‘mirror life’ are now calling for all new research to be halted.

Scientists have called for a halt to the creation of “mirror bacteria” as they could bypass the immune defenses of all life on Earth and lead to deadly infections.

Dr Von Cooper, a microbiologist from the University of Pittsburgh and co-author of the paper, says: “This life form never existed or evolved, therefore all biological interactions would be different or probably not work.

“We don’t want to limit this promise for synthetic biology, but building a mirror bacterium is not worth the risk».

What is life in the mirror?

Just as our left hand is a mirror image of our right hand, many biological molecules also have a left- and right-handed mirror molecule.

Author Professor Gregory Winter, a Nobel Prize-winning biologist from the University of Cambridge, told MailOnline: ‘The danger of mirror life, particularly mirror bacteria, is that living organisms will not recognize their mirror counterparts as ‘foreign’ and they have the natural defenses to protect themselves from their attacks.

“For example, people would struggle to make antibodies against mirror bacteria and would not be able to control an infection. Similar arguments apply to all other living organisms, including plants that are attacked by mirror bacteria.”

Even if humans find a way to defend themselves against this new threat, the mirror bacteria could destabilize large parts of the world’s ecosystem.

Author Dr Nicholas Talbot, plant disease expert and executive director of the Sainsbury’s Laboratory told MailOnline: ‘It seems very likely that a mirror bacterium could infect some plants.

“If major food crops were vulnerable, the impact would be devastating — along with the other impacts.”

The good news is that the technology to create life-mirror is still far away.