4 ms·

Using precision editing to study human embryo development shows master gene

67 points by gmays 4mo ago

ape4 4mo ago
I wonder what the regulations are for this sort of work
- bpodgursky 4mo ago
  In the US it's legal-sorta but the NIH can't fund it and the FDA is not allowed to approve treatments based on it. So someone could do it in a research setting but there's not a pathway to market in the US (in practice people will do the first ones in a friendly legal climate like Peru).
  - bonsai_spool 4mo ago
    > In the US it's legal-sorta but the NIH can't fund it and the FDA is not allowed to approve treatments based on it What references are you following? Haven't heard this before.
    - Onavo 4mo ago
      > the FDA is not allowed to approve treatments based on it Unless you live in the Whitehouse.
    - fc417fc802 4mo ago
      I don't have citations to hand but I can attest that this has been the case for a long time now. There are jurisdictions that are more open to various semi-banned (either unfundable, a regulatory morass, or both) topics of research; China is famous for offering lucrative grants to attract foreign researchers of many of these.
- kens 4mo ago
  The short answer is the "14-day" rule, which doesn't allow development of the embryo beyond 14 days. The article gives specifics under the heading "Ethical and legal compliance"
deleted 4mo ago
[deleted]
Magicrafter13 4mo ago
[flagged]
- jtbayly 4mo ago
  [flagged]
- forgetfreeman 4mo ago
  You're in for a real treat when you find out how we got organ transplantation.
  - Onavo 4mo ago
    OP probably thinks medicine and biotech magically manifest through divine inspiration.
  - zmgsabst 4mo ago
    How so? A quick search suggests that we tried it a bunch on animals, failed on humans, and of the first three human transplants, you had an adult (20s), toddler (2yr), and adult (50s). All of them were due to medical necessity, as it was a high risk procedure. Is there something you imagine the poster would be shocked by in that history?
- meindnoch 4mo ago
  [flagged]
  - jdiff 4mo ago
    Even in real pregnancies, it's estimated that as many as three quarters of all fertilized eggs fail to implant in the uterus. If one was of the opinion that life begins at conception, one should certainly be aware of that silent holocaust that has and always will eclipse all others for all of human existence.
    - ryandrake 4mo ago
      Don't worry, the Fundies are already working on punishing women for miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies. I'm sure implantation failure is on the list...
MichaelZuo 4mo ago
Does anyone know why such a fundamental gene would have such different behaviours between mammals? > In previous mouse studies, loss of NANOG disrupted both the epiblast and the yolk sac - a tissue that supports the developing embryo. In this human embryo study, loss of NANOG primarily affected the epiblast, the future body-forming line of cells.
smalltorch 4mo ago
I think it's more of the fact that they were conceived which will bother most. A sperm on its own was never going to be a person. A egg on its own was never going to be a person. A embryo... we cause the sparks to fly here and it's disturbing to think we can poke at the genes when we really have no idea what we are doing. Was a soul created here? Lot of people think yes. So lots of people naturally care about that taking place. Just to poke and prod 1 of billions of base pairs to see what happens does not seem like a good idea or..even a practical way to learn anything. I would bargain there are a lot more pairs you could mess with that would have the same effect and would prevent the embryo from developing further. I lean that we most likely are creating souls (however that works...) the moment of conception and we probably should be fooling around with doing this stuff. This article reminded me of this video I saw 10 years ago that shows there is a moment in time where sparks literally fly and it's pretty amazing to see. https://vimeo.com/163864531 https://vimeo.com/163864531
- efnx 4mo ago
  So do all sexually reproducing species’ conception create souls? Or is it just a blessed few? What about asexually reproducing species?
  - smalltorch 4mo ago
    >So do all sexually reproducing species’ conception create souls? No, what is your opinion? >Or is it just a blessed few? Specifically humans. >What about asexually reproducing species? They have life that's for sure but I think it's very different than humans.
    - iknowstuff 4mo ago
      you can't seriously think there is a line in the sand between homo sapiens and heidelbergensis or neanderthals which demarcates "soul" and "no soul". Especially since the latter interbred with humans.
      - pizzafeelsright 4mo ago
j16sdiz 4mo ago
> Base editing can precisely change a single nucleotide base pair... Absolutely not. It _cut_ the DNA at three nine precision (not that great given the number of base pairs we have); and things sitch together at much higher error rate. It is a great technology, but it is not as great as many claim

67 points by gmays 4mo ago

ape4 4mo ago

I wonder what the regulations are for this sort of work

bpodgursky 4mo ago
In the US it's legal-sorta but the NIH can't fund it and the FDA is not allowed to approve treatments based on it. So someone could do it in a research setting but there's not a pathway to market in the US (in practice people will do the first ones in a friendly legal climate like Peru).
- bonsai_spool 4mo ago
  > In the US it's legal-sorta but the NIH can't fund it and the FDA is not allowed to approve treatments based on it What references are you following? Haven't heard this before.
  - Onavo 4mo ago
    > the FDA is not allowed to approve treatments based on it Unless you live in the Whitehouse.
  - fc417fc802 4mo ago
    I don't have citations to hand but I can attest that this has been the case for a long time now. There are jurisdictions that are more open to various semi-banned (either unfundable, a regulatory morass, or both) topics of research; China is famous for offering lucrative grants to attract foreign researchers of many of these.
kens 4mo ago
The short answer is the "14-day" rule, which doesn't allow development of the embryo beyond 14 days. The article gives specifics under the heading "Ethical and legal compliance"

deleted 4mo ago

[deleted]

Magicrafter13 4mo ago

[flagged]

jtbayly 4mo ago
[flagged]
forgetfreeman 4mo ago
You're in for a real treat when you find out how we got organ transplantation.
- Onavo 4mo ago
  OP probably thinks medicine and biotech magically manifest through divine inspiration.
- zmgsabst 4mo ago
  How so? A quick search suggests that we tried it a bunch on animals, failed on humans, and of the first three human transplants, you had an adult (20s), toddler (2yr), and adult (50s). All of them were due to medical necessity, as it was a high risk procedure. Is there something you imagine the poster would be shocked by in that history?
meindnoch 4mo ago
[flagged]
- jdiff 4mo ago
  Even in real pregnancies, it's estimated that as many as three quarters of all fertilized eggs fail to implant in the uterus. If one was of the opinion that life begins at conception, one should certainly be aware of that silent holocaust that has and always will eclipse all others for all of human existence.
  - ryandrake 4mo ago
    Don't worry, the Fundies are already working on punishing women for miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies. I'm sure implantation failure is on the list...

MichaelZuo 4mo ago

Does anyone know why such a fundamental gene would have such different behaviours between mammals? > In previous mouse studies, loss of NANOG disrupted both the epiblast and the yolk sac - a tissue that supports the developing embryo. In this human embryo study, loss of NANOG primarily affected the epiblast, the future body-forming line of cells.

smalltorch 4mo ago

I think it's more of the fact that they were conceived which will bother most. A sperm on its own was never going to be a person. A egg on its own was never going to be a person. A embryo... we cause the sparks to fly here and it's disturbing to think we can poke at the genes when we really have no idea what we are doing. Was a soul created here? Lot of people think yes. So lots of people naturally care about that taking place. Just to poke and prod 1 of billions of base pairs to see what happens does not seem like a good idea or..even a practical way to learn anything. I would bargain there are a lot more pairs you could mess with that would have the same effect and would prevent the embryo from developing further. I lean that we most likely are creating souls (however that works...) the moment of conception and we probably should be fooling around with doing this stuff. This article reminded me of this video I saw 10 years ago that shows there is a moment in time where sparks literally fly and it's pretty amazing to see. https://vimeo.com/163864531 https://vimeo.com/163864531

efnx 4mo ago
So do all sexually reproducing species’ conception create souls? Or is it just a blessed few? What about asexually reproducing species?
- smalltorch 4mo ago
  >So do all sexually reproducing species’ conception create souls? No, what is your opinion? >Or is it just a blessed few? Specifically humans. >What about asexually reproducing species? They have life that's for sure but I think it's very different than humans.
  - iknowstuff 4mo ago
    you can't seriously think there is a line in the sand between homo sapiens and heidelbergensis or neanderthals which demarcates "soul" and "no soul". Especially since the latter interbred with humans.
    - pizzafeelsright 4mo ago

j16sdiz 4mo ago

> Base editing can precisely change a single nucleotide base pair... Absolutely not. It _cut_ the DNA at three nine precision (not that great given the number of base pairs we have); and things sitch together at much higher error rate. It is a great technology, but it is not as great as many claim