genetic modification Archives

Live Blogging #GeneEditSummit Day 1 Post #4: Societal Implications of human gene editing

December 1, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D. / 4 Comments

This is post #4 of my live blogging of the #GeneEditSummit today. It is focused on societal implications so I’m really looking forward to it. You can read posts 1-3, here, here, and here summarizing the talks and key points from the meeting so far. Annelien L. Bredenoord, University Medical Center Utrecht, chaired the session. John Harris, […]

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Live Blogging NAS Human Gene Editing Summit: #GeneEditSummit

November 28, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D.

The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) summit on Human Gene Editing will begin in a few days on December 1 in Washington, D.C. This summit is in part the extension of discussions that started at a more informal meeting on CRISPR earlier this year in Napa organized by Jennifer Doudna and colleagues. The NAS meeting

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FDA approves 1st GM animal (fast-growing salmon) to eat

November 19, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D. / 14 Comments

After a seemingly endless period of review, the FDA has approved the genetically modified (GM) AquaBounty salmon for sale and consumption. Update: You might find my interview with George Church on CRISPR and gene modification interesting. I don’t see any particular reason to think that this GM fish as a food would pose any significant

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Poll: Is sex a form of human genetic modification?

September 22, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D. / 2 Comments

Is sex a form of genetic modification? A fairly common argument out there is that human decisions about mates and then their actual sexual reproduction are forms of human genetic modification. Sex is also sometimes equated with genetic modification of organisms by a few scientists. What do you think? Are these things equivalent? Similar? Not

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Trump makes case for germline human genetic modification?

August 27, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D. / 1 Comment

Flying out of Portland Airport yesterday, I saw these magazines side by side: Trump and genetic modification of humans. Hmmm. That’s a humorous juxtaposition and the two covers are oddly similar in design. It go me thinking… Could using germline human genetic modification be a wise thing to do in some cases? After all, humanity

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White House supports moratorium on heritable human CRISPR

May 27, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D.

The Obama Administration today weighed in on human germline genetic modification such as via CRISPR via a note from John Holdren, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, and Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. The White House indicated support for the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the National Academy

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GMO: Why 3 Such Difficult Little Letters?

May 5, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D. / 11 Comments

What is a GMO? I realized a few years ago that I really should know a lot more about the whole debate over genetically modified (GM) organisms (GMOs). What are the facts on GMOs? As a scientist who has for many years done amongst other things genetics research including making and studying so-called “knockout mice”

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Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte Cell Paper on Gene Editing for Mitochondrial Disease

April 23, 2015 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D. / 2 Comments

The Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte group published a Cell paper today on using gene editing to reverse mutations associated with human mitochondrial disease. The paper is Reddy, et al. and is entitled, “Selective Elimination of Mitochondrial Mutations in the Germline by Genome Editing”. The authors report success using TALEN-based gene editing or mitochondrial-direct restriction enzyme (mito-ApaLI)

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The Genomics Revolution: move over blood type, here comes your genotype

June 23, 2011 / Professor Paul Knoepfler, Ph.D. / 4 Comments

As I am writing this, a revolution in medicine and science is building up steam around the world called Genomics. Let me clue you in so you do not miss the boat on this dramatic change coming in our lives. Genomics means the study of genomes. A genome is the complete sequence of an organism’s DNA,

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