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If you're looking for offspring without some particular mutation you're much better of with embryo selection rather than trying to use CRISPR. It's only when y
by Symmetry 7y ago
If you're looking for offspring without some particular mutation you're much better of with embryo selection rather than trying to use CRISPR. It's only when you have some specific trait not present in the parents that you'd even want to consider it, really. Well, if you've got a problem on the y-chromosome or the mitochondria then you have a good medical reason but there just isn't that much on the y-chromosome and the three-parent embryo thing in the article is a good solution for mitochondrial DNA problems.
- derefr 7y agoWhat about some specific trait present in both parents, that will get worse in the child if both parents have it, because it’s a phenotype influenced by the number of copies of a gene the parents each have, and the gene is dominant? Cystic fibrosis, for example. Be nice to just slice all the copies out and start fresh, so that the child isn’t even a carrier.
- Symmetry 7y agoI'm confused here, I'd always thought that Cystic Fibrosis was a classic Mendelian recessive and a quick look at Wikipedia suggests that's correct. If you want to get rid of an autosomal recessive gene through embryo selection just make a few blastocysts and only implant one that doesn't carry any copies of the allele you don't like. If you do have a gene with a number of copies on each chromosome, like the one for amylase say, the number of copies of one type or another don't generally have enough of an effect to get too worked up over it?