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 […]
History tells us to be more skeptical of He Jiankui’s CRISPR baby story Read More »
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
Trying to connect the dots on CRISPR baby story paints a dark, cloudy picture Read More »
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
Why CRISPR baby production (if it happened) was unethical & dangerous Read More »
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
Lessons from sharks: how we might grow new teeth via stem cells Read More »
Here is my initial list of 2019 Stem Cell Meetings & Conferences. Send me your listings if you don’t see your meeting here so I can start fleshing out the list more. Meeting listings are not endorsements and I try to make this list fairly comprehensive of as many stem cell meetings as I can.
A germinal list of 2019 stem cell meetings and conferences Read More »
Here is our listing of 2019 Stem Cell Meetings & Conferences. Send me your listings if you don’t see your meeting here. Meeting listings are not endorsements and I try to make this list fairly comprehensive. January ARM Cell & Gene Therapies State of the Industry Briefing San Francisco, CA, USA (Held January 7, 2019)
2019 Stem Cell Meetings List Read More »
Time to sell exosome therapies to patients? No. Some stem cell clinics and related firms are looking for new ways to make profits and toward that goal a few have latched onto the legitimate buzz around exosome research. What are exosomes? Imagine if you could bubble up a pea-sized sphere off your skin full of
As exosome work advances, clinics pitch unproven therapies to patients Read More »
The debate over whether the main conclusions of the Nature paper on human embryo CRISPR led by Shoukhrat Mitalipov’s lab at Oregon Health Sciences University (OHSU) are correct remains unresolved. Note that Nature just added an editorial alert just above the references section to their paper: “Updated online 02 October 2017. Editorial Note: Readers are alerted that some
Why Mitalipov’s ‘magic’ room for human embryo CRISPR may give us pause Read More »
More CRISPR’d human embryos, but this time in America? MIT Tech Review is reporting that Oregon scientist Shoukhrat Mitalipov has used CRISPR on human embryos in his lab in the US. Apparently a paper is in the works on this. While details are sketchy and some specifics remain to be clarified to be sure of
In first for U.S., Mitalipov reportedly CRISPR’d human embryos & it was great Read More »
Are designer babies made using CRISPR or other genetic modification technologies closer to reality today? If so, what exactly should we do about it? Researchers can use CRISPR to genetically modify just about any organism or its cells, but targeting humans is the subject of the most intense discussion including using CRISPR in the human germline
CRISPR, human genetic modification, & a needed course correction Read More »