Search Results for: china

Monkey-pig chimeras pub discouraging for similar human research toward organ transplants

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pig-monkey-chimera-that-was-born-but-died

Michael Le Page over at The New Scientist reports on a new paper describing the birth of monkey-piglet chimeras. Unlike most such primate embryo chimeras formed in research in the past, these were allowed to be born. A litter of ten from the new monkey-pig research, two of which were chimeras, all rather quickly died […]

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Stem cell & regenerative medicine meetings for you to go to in 2019

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Stem-Cell-Meetings-2019

I keep a yearly hub of stem cell & regenerative medicine meetings here on The Niche. Below I’ve pasted the list for 2019, which continues to grow. If you don’t see yours listed, send me an email with the info including a link (knoepflerATucdavisDOTedu). These meeting listings are not endorsements and I try to make

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Counterpoints to Lovell-Badge & Daley’s CRISPR baby rationales

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CRISPR-baby

Two prominent scientists, Robin Lovell-Badge and George Daley, have been amongst the most outspoken proponents of leaving the door open to heritable human genetic modification via CRISPR. While they each have articulated their reasons in somewhat different ways at times, their core reasons arguing in favor of future heritable CRISPR appear largely the same. In

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Who is He Jiankui’s mentor Michael Deem & is he trying to edit himself out of CRISPR baby project?

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Michael-Deem

Who is Michael Deem and what was his role in his former student He Jiankui’s purported production of twin CRISPR’d babies? Is Deem now trying to edit himself out of the project? He Jiankui relied on help from many people and Deem was reportedly a part of that team. Members of He’s own research team helped

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Mixed messages on CRISPR babies from National Academies versus their experts: a look at new Science piece

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National-Academy-CRISPR-Baby-article

Three national academy leaders have a new opinion piece in Science on what the community needs to do next regarding human germline editing now that we are most likely in the CRISPR babies era. Some of us have been wondering what the Academies and their empowered experts really think about this issue and what they

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History tells us to be more skeptical of He Jiankui’s CRISPR baby story

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Fake-cloning

Could He Jiankui have faked part or all of his CRISPR babies story? If so, how? Why? Or to put it another way, almost everyone seems to be assuming the story is real, but should we be more skeptical? Should we flip things around and assume the story isn’t entirely kosher until proven otherwise? I once

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Trying to connect the dots on CRISPR baby story paints a dark, cloudy picture

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connect-the-dots

When I was a little kid I played this game called “connect the dots” or “dot-to-dot”, where you draw a line from dot-to-dot in numerical order and at some point a picture starts to emerge. I think kids and even some adults still play this today. They even come in extreme versions with hundreds or

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Why CRISPR baby production (if it happened) was unethical & dangerous

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Jiankui-He-who-claims-CRISPR-baby-production

Reports are out that a scientist in China has been working to make a CRISPR baby for some time and supposedly has made twin genetically modified babies. I see this work as unethical and dangerous. Just a couple years ago when I published my book GMO Sapiens on potential use of CRISPR in a heritable manner

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Lessons from sharks: how we might grow new teeth via stem cells

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shark-new-teeth

What if we could grow new teeth from stem cells to replace lost ones or fix others that have big cavities again via tooth stem cells? While humans and some other animals like dogs have only two sets of teeth — so-called baby and adult teeth — in their lives, other animals aren’t so limited. For

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