CRISPR Babies

[interpreter]

One of Discover Magazine's top ten stories of 2015:

Chinese scientists, the only scientists allowed to experiment on human embryos, attempted to squash an inherited, potentially fatal blood disorder by injecting 86 "non-viable" human embryos with the gene editing system called CRISPR. The magazine doesn't say what CRISPR stands for, but it basically seeks out defective genes and replaces them with good ones. Theoretically a baby born that way could not only live to be a 100 years old (or more), but it could have blond hair and blue eyes if the parents so desired. Anyhow, the Chinese scientists have revealed that the gene-editing worked for only 4 of the embroyos and created 82 "unintentional mutations."

CRISPR has been outlawed in the US, but not in other nations. London scientists have applied to the UK's government authority on fertility research for permission to use CRISPR on viable human embroyos. My question is, if they manage to create 4 super babies, while creating 82 mutants, what will they do with the mutants?

 

[Desk trauma]

The magazine doesn't say what CRISPR stands for...

Clustered regularly-interspaced short palindromic repeats.

My question is, if they manage to create 4 super babies, while creating 82 mutants, what will they do with the mutants?

Embryos. Not babies, embryos. I am just guessing but I would say that all of them were put into the waste once the experiment was over.

A link to the article would be useful.

 

[interpreter]

Clustered regularly-interspaced short palindromic repeats.



Embryos. Not babies, embryos. I am just guessing but I would say that all of them were put into the waste once the experiment was over.

No, they're talking about doing it with "viable" embryos, i.e., real live babies. The future is here. So my question is, will they kill all the mutants or let them live?

 

[Desk trauma]

How about a link to the article? Knowing what was said would be very helpful in discussing this.

No, they're talking about doing it with "viable" embryos, i.e., real live babies.

Are you operating under the assumption that research with embryos is done in utero? Embryo in petri dishes do not come to term.

So my question is, will they kill all the mutants or let them live?

Again, we are talking about embryonic experimentation here not full term.

Also again, how about a link to the article?

 

[expos4ever]

How about a link to the article? Knowing what was said would be very helpful in discussing this.

I second this request. The details do indeed matter and we need to know more.

 

[Nithavela]

The mutants will of course form a band of superheroes and fight crime.

 

[interpreter]

The mutants will of course form a band of superheroes and fight crime.

My thoughts exactly. 82 new super races of humans.

 

[expos4ever]

I suspect the real issue here for the person who started this thread is the ethics of such "human engineering". Setting aside for the moment the admittedly important question of the morality of aborting fetuses, I would assert the Christian should be entirely in favour of responsible efforts by qualified scientists to try to "fix" genetically-transmitted illnesses. Now obviously lines need to be drawn - while we should do all we can to engineer solutions to genetically transmitted illnesses (e.g. Huntington's), we should not be in the business of engineering humans to be tall and blond. Perhaps some will argue that it is difficult to draw this line of distinction. Fair enough, we can talk about that.

 

[Desk trauma]

My thoughts exactly. 82 new super races of humans.

How about a link to the article?

 

[interpreter]

How about a link to the article?

Discover Magazine Jan/Feb 2016, "The Ethics of Editing Human Embyos" p.20. I cant find anything on it on the web, so I guess you'll just have to buy it.

 

[Desk trauma]

I cant find anything on it on the web, so I guess you'll just have to buy it.

No, I will not.

Extraordinary claims, extraordinary evidence and all that.

 

[expos4ever]

The extract from the article declares that the 86 fetuses are non-viable. So I do not see the concern - none of these fetuses (neither the 4 nor the 82) can go on to become a living person (I assume this is what it means to be non-viable).

 

[Desk trauma]

The extract from the article declares that the 86 fetuses are non-viable. So I do not see the concern - none of these fetuses (neither the 4 nor the 82) can go on to become a living person (I assume this is what it means to be non-viable).

My totally layman take on the matter makes me think that they are past the point where they could be implanted and brought to term or that the process it self made them unable to come to term.

If I have an article to look at I would be able to form a better informed opinion....

 

[interpreter]

No, I will not.

Extraordinary claims, extraordinary evidence and all that.

LOL. What did you do before the internet? You can always go to the Library if you don't want to buy it.

 

[Desk trauma]

LOL. What did you do before the internet?

Same thing I do now, ask to see the source.

Once again, extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence.

 

[Sistrin]

No, I will not.

Extraordinary claims, extraordinary evidence and all that.

I have never understood this need to berate someone for not providing a link to an article the person doing the complaining could look up for themselves with an investment of about thirty seconds.

The Ethics of Editing Human Embryos

Imagine if genetic diseases could be removed from the very biological code of our species — a future in which the likes of hemophilia, cystic fibrosis or dozens of other afflictions are simply edited out of human embryos.

In April online in the journal Protein and Cell, a team of Chinese scientistsreported the first documented experiment to do just that.

The researchers attempted to quash an inherited, potentially fatal blood disorder by injecting 86 non-viable human embryos with the gene-editing system CRISPR/ Cas9. In recent years, CRISPR has emerged as a game-changing tool in biology, allowing researchers to tweak an organism’s DNA with unprecedented ease. Based on a defense mechanism in the immune system of bacteria that hunts and destroys invading viruses, CRISPR can locate and replace specific genes.

In the human embryo experiment, the researchers used it to delete a faulty gene and replace it with one that produces normal blood cells. But the editing worked for only four of the embryos and created numerous unintentional mutations.

Source: http://discovermagazine.com/2016/janfeb/10-the-ethics-of-editing-human-embryos

The internal link leads to the abstract:

CRISPR/Cas9-mediated gene editing in human tripronuclear zygotes

Genome editing tools such as the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat (CRISPR)-associated system (Cas) have been widely used to modify genes in model systems including animal zygotes and human cells, and hold tremendous promise for both basic research and clinical applications. To date, a serious knowledge gap remains in our understanding of DNA repair mechanisms in human early embryos, and in the efficiency and potential off-target effects of using technologies such as CRISPR/Cas9 in human pre-implantation embryos. In this report, we used tripronuclear (3PN) zygotes to further investigate CRISPR/Cas9-mediated gene editing in human cells. We found that CRISPR/Cas9 could effectively cleave the endogenous β-globin gene (HBB). However, the efficiency of homologous recombination directed repair (HDR) of HBB was low and the edited embryos were mosaic. Off-target cleavage was also apparent in these 3PN zygotes as revealed by the T7E1 assay and whole-exome sequencing. Furthermore, the endogenous delta-globin gene (HBD), which is homologous to HBB, competed with exogenous donor oligos to act as the repair template, leading to untoward mutations. Our data also indicated that repair of the HBBlocus in these embryos occurred preferentially through the non-crossover HDR pathway. Taken together, our work highlights the pressing need to further improve the fidelity and specificity of the CRISPR/Cas9 platform, a prerequisite for any clinical applications of CRSIPR/Cas9-mediated editing.

Source: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13238-015-0153-5

Nature has an article about it here:

http://www.nature.com/news/scientists-sound-alarm-over-dna-editing-of-human-embryos-1.17110

Seriously DT, this isn't hard.

 

[interpreter]

My totally layman take on the matter makes me think that they are past the point where they could be implanted and brought to term or that the process it self made them unable to come to term.

If I have an article to look at I would be able to form a better informed opinion....

Why are you guys talking about what the Chinese scientists did? I am talking about what the UK scientists at the Francis Crick Institute in London say they are going to do this year, with real babies (unless someone stops them).

 

[expos4ever]

We still need more details on precisely what the UK scientists actually intend to do. With all respect, its not fair for us to assume your characterization of their intent is accurate. I bet there is something you are not telling us.

 

[pgp_protector]

Discover Magazine Jan/Feb 2016, "The Ethics of Editing Human Embyos" p.20. I cant find anything on it on the web, so I guess you'll just have to buy it.

You really need to practice your Googling then.
http://bfy.tw/3gq5

leads to -> http://discovermagazine.com/2016/janfeb/10-the-ethics-of-editing-human-embryos

 

[pgp_protector]

I have never understood this need to berate someone for not providing a link to an article the person doing the complaining could look up for themselves with an investment of about thirty seconds.
...snip...

The requesting a Link might have something to do with the Sticky at the top of this section

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