Scientific Ethics and Gene Edited Babies
By Françoise Baylis,
The Boston Globe
| 01. 05. 2020
Three babies, three scientists, three years in jail, and a three million yuan fine. This is the story of He Jiankui and the world’s first genome edited babies.
In November 2018, on the eve of the Second International Summit on Human Genome editing in Hong Kong, news leaked that a Chinese scientist had created genome-edited twins using CRISPR technology, which allows scientists to remove, add, or alter DNA. The news that genetically modified embryos had been used to create the twins was confirmed by He in a YouTube video and a follow-up presentation at the Hong Kong Summit. He explained that he had modified the CCR5 gene to provide the infants with resistance to HIV. During the Q&A period following his presentation, He confirmed that there was another ongoing pregnancy.
He’s experiment was widely condemned on both scientific and ethical grounds. In China, scientists insisted the research was premature. They also feared this controversial experiment would tarnish their scientific reputation for having failed to take ethics seriously. Over a hundred Chinese scientists signed a letter condemning the CRISPR baby experiment...
Related Articles
By Carl Zimmer, The New York Times | 03.10.2024
In 1889, a French doctor named Francois-Gilbert Viault climbed down from a mountain in the Andes, drew blood from his arm and inspected it under a microscope. Dr. Viault’s red blood cells, which ferry oxygen, had surged 42 percent. He...
By Ian Sample, The Guardian | 03.08.2024
Scientists are a step closer to making IVF eggs from patients’ skin cells after adapting the procedure that created Dolly the sheep, the first cloned mammal, more than two decades ago.
The work raises the prospect of older women being...
By Mariella Bodemeier Loayza Careaga, The Scientist | 03.15.2024
Scientists have genetically modified isolated microbes for decades. Now, using CRISPR, they intend to target entire microbiomes.
Humans are never alone. Even in a room devoid of other people, they are always in the company of billions of microscopic beings...
Sheep have been domesticated for roughly 12,000 years. Sheep have also been cloned since 1996; Dolly (pictured) was the first mammal to suffer that indignity. But this news was featured in the March 14 issue of Business Insider:
Montana rancher paid $4,200 to clone a dead sheep and launched a farm of super hybrids worth up to $550,000
Some people — not just Montanans but Texans too and probably others — pay to indulge in “captive hunting,” and large...