By: Julie Fidler Natural Society | CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing has been hailed as one of the biggest scientific breakthroughs of our lifetime. The te… | Pinterest

Just Pinned to Domestic and Global News: By: Julie Fidler Natural Society | CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing has been hailed as one of the biggest scientific breakthroughs of our lifetime. The technology is often called molecular scissors for its ability to cut and paste pieces of DNA thereby removing unwanted traits and replacing them with more desirable ones. CRISPR is beingcelebrated for its accuracy but a recent study sheds light on some imperfections surrounding the technology that we should be aware of. When researchers at Columbia University used CRISPR-Cas9 to correct blindness in mice they found that the process did successfully edit the gene responsible for blindness. However it also caused unintentional mutations to more than 1000 other genes. Its exactly what critics of the technology have been warning about that in the process of fixing part of the human genome scientists could actually wind up doing irreparable damage. [1] Study co-author Stephen Tsang M.D. Ph.D. associate professor of ophthalmology pathology and cell biology at CUMC Columbias Institute of Genomic Medicine and the Institute of Human Nutrition said: We feel its critical that the scientific community consider th
from bitly http://bit.ly/2rzDjpG
via IFTTT