A gene-therapy technique that aims to prevent mothers from passing on harmful genes to children through their mitochondria — the cell’s energy-producing structures — might not always work.
Tag: genes
Gene-Editing Research in Human Embryos Gains Momentum
At the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Fredrik Lanner is preparing to edit genes in human embryos. It’s the kind of research that sparked an international frenzy in April last year, when a Chinese team revealed that it had done the world’s first such experiments.
Chinese Scientists Genetically Modify Human Embryos for the Second Time
Scientists in China have reported genetically modifying human embryos in what is only the second published experiment of its kind. Last year, a different team of Chinese researchers edited human embryos in an attempt to remove genes responsible for a dangerous blood disorder. In this new research, scientists from Guangzhou Medical University tried to add a mutation to embryos instead, attempting to make them HIV-resistant. In both cases, the experiments were only partially successful, and were carried out using non-viable human embryos that were incapable of growing into adults.
Genetically-Modified Human Embryos Won’t Create Designer Babies
Creating genetically-modified (GM) embryos is controversial. Because editing genes raises ethical concerns over unintended consequences, the Society for Developmental Biology called for a moratorium on manipulating pre-implantation embryos.
California Considers Funding Controversial Research: Editing Genes in Human Embryos
The California Institute of Regenerative Medicine was created in 2004 to fund stem cell research, after the federal government stopped paying for most experiments with human embryos. Now the state agency is considering underwriting another controversial use of embryos that the federal government won’t support — editing their genes.
Scientists Could One Day Create Genetically Modified ‘Designer Babies’ — But Should They?
This week, the Congressional Research and Technology Subcommittee held its first hearing on the science and ethics of genetically modifying human DNA. The main topic up for discussion was CRISPR, the world’s most promising and widely applicable gene-editing technique. So far, CRISPR (pronounced crisper) has been used by multiple labs around the world to modify the genes of organisms as varied as bacteria, plants, mice and some primates. But what lawmakers wanted to talk about with scientists this week is what it will mean when we start making genetic improvements to human beings.
First Evidence of How Parents’ Lives Could Change Children’s DNA
For the first time, scientists have discovered a mechanism in humans that could explain how your lifestyle choices may impact your children and grandchildren’s genes.
Why I Can’t Just Throw Out Frozen Sperm
All it needs is for me to sign the 18 letters of my name, giving the fertility clinic permission to thaw and discard our donor’s sperm – the remaining fractions from a week he spent here four years ago for the sole purpose of donating his genes, his history and a little piece of his soul to help us build our family.
Virus Hiding in Our Genome Protects Early Human Embryos
We may owe our survival and complexity to a stowaway virus that springs to life in the very first cells of human embryos. Not only does the virus seem to protect embryos from other viruses, but it also assists genes when the groundwork is under way for the body plan of a new human.
Body Proportions Go Back to the Egg … and Its Ration of Maternal Resources
It has been said that nothing requires an architect’s care more than “due proportions.” What is true of buildings is also true of bodies, though the means by which bodies achieve their proportions are rather more mysterious than an architect’s whims. With bodies, much depends on genes, gene expression, and the localization and diffusion gradients of gene products called morphogens.