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Part-human part-mouse brain developed in science breakthrough

bbc.com

11–20 of 34 posts

Re: Part-human part-mouse brain developed in science breakthrough

#12
The article walks the headline back pretty quickly. Parts of human brains in mice becomes "pieces of brain-like tissue" made from skin cells and formed into "collections of connected, living cells" followed by a line on how there's "no indication that what's being created here are mice that can think like humans, or a human brain in a mouse body." and that the human cells started to look and function like the outer layer of the mouse's brain as opposed to looking or functioning like a part of a human brain.

It's still kind of neat though and I hope it's actually somehow useful for something.

Re: Part-human part-mouse brain developed in science breakthrough

#17

Great news: we're excellent at curing mice of diseases. All this time we've been trying to find drugs that have the same effect in humans as they do in mice, but until now no one has had the insight or bravery to ask the question, "What if we just made people more mouse?" Exciting stuff.

> until now no one has had the insight or bravery to ask the question, "What if we just made people more mouse?" Exciting stuff. This is making mice more people, but either way it's an exciting day for mice everywhere.

Not really, since this is just inventing new and exciting ways to give mice more brain diseases

Re: Part-human part-mouse brain developed in science breakthrough

#18
post #4

> The scientists said their work, published in the journal Nature, was carried out with independent ethical scrutiny. oh, I guess there's nothing to be concerned about.

I think you just misread that - the adjective independent refers to ethical, not scrutiny /s

Re: Part-human part-mouse brain developed in science breakthrough

#19
post #9

Does this remind anyone of that novel Flowers for Algernon..?

That story was so sad, reading it was like actually going through the process together with the main character. The past few years I seem to be seeing more and more experiments with growing brains in laboratories. Aren't there laws regulating bioethics that forbid such questionable practices? Not that laws ever stopped determined nation states or private researchers from pursuing knowledge - or profit, or competitive…

> Aren't there laws regulating bioethics that forbid such questionable practices?

Not generally, no. Most of it is by convention coupled with the fact that no reputable journal will publish your work these days if you don't go through an IRB for certain types of work. There's also the funding angle, with most work being paid for by one of a few very large governmental bodies and each of those having stringent rules about what they do and don't permit.

Basically pursuing certain lines of research would make you unemployable thus (almost) nobody does it. Unless it looks likely to turn a profit in which case you can start a company and try your luck with VCs.

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