Angela
Elite member
- Messages
- 21,823
- Reaction score
- 12,328
- Points
- 113
- Ethnic group
- Italian
See:
http://gizmodo.com/the-fda-is-crack...dium=sharefromsite&utm_source=Gizmodo_twitter
The motivation is a good one: remove the genetic diseases which have accumulated in very inbred dog breeds.
The problem as the FDA probably sees it is that if it is this easy and inexpensive to do in some garage lab what could come out of some of these labs, not just in terms of animals, but of humans.
"Ishee joined the ranks of DIY biohackers after becoming frustrated with the limits of
traditional dog breeding. He breeds mastiffs—huge, friendly dogs that are known to be riddled with genetic disorders. Over a few generations, Ishee has used traditional techniques to breed out many troublesome conditions, such as the sagging skin and oversized head that make many mastiffs look goofy. But some recessive conditions, like hip dysplasia, could not simply be bred away.
And so for $1,000, two years ago he built a lab in his backyard shed capable of doing everything from culturing tissue to altering the DNA of canine sperm. Then he began trying to attack his dog breeding problems with genetic engineering. He is currently experimenting with different ways he might modify the DNA before artificially inseminating female dogs. In an early test to see whether his methods work, he fused sperm with genes from glowing bacteria in an attempt to engineer glowing puppies, though the pregnancy failed to take. Undeterred, he’s now gearing up to tackle even bigger challenges.
But he hit a roadblock earlier this month, when the FDA proposed a new rule that would require any genetically engineered animal go through a strict regulatory procedure. In essence, the FDA wants to define any animal a scientist purposefully genetically modifies as a “drug.” That means that if a scientist say, created cows without horns that are safer to farm, those cows would have to go through a vetting process similar to new drugs.
Ishee was preparing for a project that sought to cure hyperuricemia in Dalmatians—a common liver malfunction that frequently results in kidney stones, bladder stones or gout.
“It should be straight forward,” he told Gizmodo. Ishee plans to use the gene-editing technique CRISPR to correct the single errant nucleotide that causes the condition, reversing the mutation to turn a T in the genetic code back into the correct G. Then he’ll use a technique called sperm-mediated gene transfer, which will allow him to transfer his engineered Dalmation DNA to a female Dalmation, resulting, he hopes, in a fertilized egg that’ll produce hyperuricemia-free pups."
http://gizmodo.com/the-fda-is-crack...dium=sharefromsite&utm_source=Gizmodo_twitter
The motivation is a good one: remove the genetic diseases which have accumulated in very inbred dog breeds.
The problem as the FDA probably sees it is that if it is this easy and inexpensive to do in some garage lab what could come out of some of these labs, not just in terms of animals, but of humans.
"Ishee joined the ranks of DIY biohackers after becoming frustrated with the limits of
traditional dog breeding. He breeds mastiffs—huge, friendly dogs that are known to be riddled with genetic disorders. Over a few generations, Ishee has used traditional techniques to breed out many troublesome conditions, such as the sagging skin and oversized head that make many mastiffs look goofy. But some recessive conditions, like hip dysplasia, could not simply be bred away.
And so for $1,000, two years ago he built a lab in his backyard shed capable of doing everything from culturing tissue to altering the DNA of canine sperm. Then he began trying to attack his dog breeding problems with genetic engineering. He is currently experimenting with different ways he might modify the DNA before artificially inseminating female dogs. In an early test to see whether his methods work, he fused sperm with genes from glowing bacteria in an attempt to engineer glowing puppies, though the pregnancy failed to take. Undeterred, he’s now gearing up to tackle even bigger challenges.
But he hit a roadblock earlier this month, when the FDA proposed a new rule that would require any genetically engineered animal go through a strict regulatory procedure. In essence, the FDA wants to define any animal a scientist purposefully genetically modifies as a “drug.” That means that if a scientist say, created cows without horns that are safer to farm, those cows would have to go through a vetting process similar to new drugs.
Ishee was preparing for a project that sought to cure hyperuricemia in Dalmatians—a common liver malfunction that frequently results in kidney stones, bladder stones or gout.
“It should be straight forward,” he told Gizmodo. Ishee plans to use the gene-editing technique CRISPR to correct the single errant nucleotide that causes the condition, reversing the mutation to turn a T in the genetic code back into the correct G. Then he’ll use a technique called sperm-mediated gene transfer, which will allow him to transfer his engineered Dalmation DNA to a female Dalmation, resulting, he hopes, in a fertilized egg that’ll produce hyperuricemia-free pups."
