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CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

npr.org

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Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#21

Post by stuntkite »

xwdv wrote: post #9

What are the limits of gene editing?

I don’t think there are any aside from money, time, and experience. If you’d like to give yourself glowing purple eyes, huge muscles, and make it so you fart clouds of illegal street drugs you can but it’s much more difficult and messy than deleting ‘node_modules’, rebuilding, and doing a `git push —force` into prod at 5PM on a Friday before you take a long weekend.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#22

Post by koeng »

zz865 wrote: post #13

Would CRISPR be the technology people would use to modify a bat virus to make it human transmissable? This stuff should stay in its box.

They could also use normal editing with PCR since the genomes are small. Also CRISPRs are in tons of organisms (I’ve amplified it from yogurt), so the box is already out there.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#23

Post by stuntkite »

zz865 wrote: post #13

Would CRISPR be the technology people would use to modify a bat virus to make it human transmissable? This stuff should stay in its box.

You would not need CRISPR to do that. If something like that ever occurred they would probably use other methods that have been very well studied for much longer and are considerably easier to apply. Including just taking blood samples from bats (or pangolins or whatever) and archiving a great compelling virus and culturing it in a lab. If you wanna add CRISPR into the mix you could also make a virus like that make someone grow some horns and get hiccups that sound like a kazoo though.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#25

Post by newsbinator »

kyriakos wrote: post #16
zz865 wrote: post #13

Would CRISPR be the technology people would use to modify a bat virus to make it human transmissable? This stuff should stay in its box.

Knives can kill and save people. Almost anything can be used for bad purposes in the wrong hands.

Not that I agree we should bury our heads in the sand like luddites, but to be fair to OP, knives can only hurt or help in a tiny human radius. It's hard to make an extinction-level weapon (or extension level accident) out of them.

Being able to edit genes at will is a different story.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#26

Post by faitswulff »

stuntkite wrote: post #17
changoplatanero wrote: post #8

Reminds me of this guy that cured himself of lactose intolerance. https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/a17804128/sc...

His YouTube channel The Thought Emporium, is amazing. He just moved into a new lab and I really appreciate what he’s working on and how he communicates it. The robot painting fluorescent proteins is neat and recently he dropped a video demonstrating his adventures making synthetic opal. Apparently the edit made him totally lactose tolerant for over a year and now he has very mild lactose intolerance. He says he hasn’…

Technically a plasmid is kind of like a software patch, but generally they're employed by bacteria and not eukaryotes like humans.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#27

Post by MeinBlutIstBlau »

changoplatanero wrote: post #8

Reminds me of this guy that cured himself of lactose intolerance. https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/a17804128/sc...

I think it's annoying people get upset that people who do this potentially damage their bodies. First of all, it's that individuals body. They can take whatever risks they want. I don't see how trying to alter your own DNA is any worse for you than skydiving. Both have inherent risks, none of which affect others. Secondly, because there is no red tape or ethical scientific practices required, this gives us the opportunity to study some anecdotal evidence and (hopefully) these people donate their bodies for research after death. We can't truly know these affects if we constantly just act so tepid about the procedures.

Imagine if we had the scientific process about literally every aspect in human life since the dawn of civilization? We'd still be making bricks with straw, manure, sand, and water because there wasn't a government sponsored test of the quality of "Roman Cement" therefore we should not use it. Some of these people who criticize a lot of science do so just for the sake of disputing it. It's a good thing this stuff happens. The more anecdotal evidence we have, the more likely it can be subject to legitimate scrutiny and understand certain pitfalls that these individuals encountered and why. Just telling these people "you're stupid, it's bad for you!" is an ultimate waste of time and just stagnates data collection.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#28

Post by caymanjim »

softwaredoug wrote: post #4

The period missing from the title makes this very hard to parse what is being said.

Agreed. NPR never used to use clickbait titles like this ("He ..." is pure clickbait). It's sad to see them doing it regularly now. I imagine the latest generation of journalists grew up thinking this is normal. I know HN prefers original headlines, but I wish these would be edited down when posted here.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#29

Post by stuntkite »

faitswulff wrote: post #26
stuntkite wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His YouTube channel The Thought Emporium, is amazing. He just moved into a new lab and I really appreciate what he’s working on and how he communicates it. The robot painting fluorescent proteins is neat and recently he dropped a video demonstrating his adventures making synthetic opal. Apparently the edit made him totally lactose tolerant for over a year and now he has very mild lactose intolerance. He says he hasn’…

Technically a plasmid is kind of like a software patch, but generally they're employed by bacteria and not eukaryotes like humans.

Interesting. I have watched nearly all of The Thought Emporium’s videos (so clearly I’m an expert, lol) and I think he uses the term plasmid to describe DNA he’s working on in the crazy bio IDE he uses. I think in this instance he applied it to a yeast that he cultured and put into pills and swallowed.

He really is doing some neat stuff though. He’s inspired me to do some small bio hacking experiments and it ALMOST makes me want to go back to college.

Re: CRISPR gene-editing breakthrough opens door to treating broad array of diseases

#30

Post by aardvarkr »

jcims wrote: post #18
changoplatanero wrote: post #8

Reminds me of this guy that cured himself of lactose intolerance. https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/a17804128/sc...

Here’s his YouTube channel: https://youtube.com/c/thethoughtemporium Amazing and alarming what a smart and dedicated person can do with limited funds.

That’s really cool, thanks for sharing! I just watched his video on the WiFi camera and I loved his presentation style
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