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Richard Dawkins on the  Dangers of CRISPR

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Richard Dawkins on the  Dangers of CRISPR

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Richard Dawkins: The Dangers of CRISPR, Designer Babies, and Artificial Genetic Mutation

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Announcement of CRISPR technology, which allows precise editing of the human genome, has been heralded as the future of individualized medicine, and a decried as a slippery slope to engineering individual human qualities. Of course, humans already know how to manipulate animal genomes through selective breeding, but there has been no appetite to try on humans what is the norm for dogs.

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Promise and peril of gene-editing technology CRISPR

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CRISPR could help rid of diseases like cystic fibrosis, muscular dystrophy and even HIV and cancer. But many scientists, including Jennifer Doudna who is credited with developing the gene-editing technology, are calling for a moratorium on its use. Only on "CBS This Morning," Doudna tells Norah O'Donnell why, for all its promise, CRISPR is surrounded by controversy.

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Neil deGrasse Tyson On CRISPR Gene Editing | NBC News

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The legendary scientist discusses how biology is being transformed by CRISPR technologies. " Subscribe to NBC News: http://nbcnews.to/SubscribeToNBC " Watch more NBC video: http://bit.ly/MoreNBCNews NBC News is a leading source of global news and information. Here you will find clips from NBC Nightly News, Meet The Press, and original digital videos.

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(Ball, 2016)

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Ball, P. (2016). CRISPR: Implications for materials science. Retrieved from https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/mrs-bulletin/news/crispr-implications-for-materials-science

Begley, S. (2015). Genome-editing find may improve system's precision. Retrieved from https://www.statnews.com/2015/09/25/genome-editing-find-may-improve-systems-precision/

Broad Instiute. (2017). Questions and answers about CRISPR. Retrieved from https://www.broadinstitute.org/what-broad/areas-focus/project-spotlight/questions-and-answers-about-crispr

Harris, J.  & Darnovsky, M. (2016). Pro and con: Should gene editing be performed on human embryos? Retrieved from http://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2016/08/human-gene-editing-pro-con-opinions/

Hsu, P., Lander, E., & Zhang, F. (2014). Development and applications of CRISPR-Cas9 for genome engineering. Cell, 157(6), 1262-1278. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2014.05.010

Kahn, J. (2015, November). The CRISPR quandary. The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/15/magazine/the-crispr-quandary.html

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CRISPR is short for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. CRISPR refers to a bacterial defense system that is employed in genome editing.  Although CRISPR was first discovered in 1993 by researcher Franciso Mojica, it was then only known as a a part of a bacterial genome as an adaptive immune system. Dr. Jennifer Doudna and Dr. Emmanuelle Charpentier in 2011 were the first to discover that CRISPR was a gene editor. Doudna and Charpentier's research stated that using CRISPR's guide RNA and tracer RNA that they could target and edit any gene (Kahn, 2015).

Feng Zhang in 2013 adapted CRISPR-Cas9, an endonuclease or enzyme that cuts target DNA, for genome editing in human and mouse cells. CRISPR-Cpf1 is another enzyme that cuts DNA as well but unlike Cas9 it is smaller, Both systems are able to be programmed for the precise targeting of the genetic code for editing. Ideally, the goal of CRISPR is to modify genes that causes disease (Broad Institute, 2017).

In genome editing, Cas9 is guided by guide RNA to a site of mutated DNA, binds to it, and cuts it which turns the gene off (Broad Institute, 2017). Cpfl cuts the two DNA strands at different lengths where as Cas9 cuts the DNA at  the same length which can lead to a mutation. Cutting the DNA at two different lengths reduces the risk of mutation and allows genome editing to likely be more precise (Begley, 2015).

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CRISPR has the potential to change the lives of many people and future generations as well. Great care must be taken to ensure that CRISPR is not abused in the way of creating designer babies or in worse case scenario, be manipulated into a biological weapon. It will need to be highly regulated worldwide to prevent anyone from abusing the power that CRISPR holds. Right now, testing of CRISPR is performed on mice and China had once experimented with nonviable embryos and CRISPR. Before we venture into experimentation on viable embryos in relation preventing genetic diseases and not for manipulation of certain traits and characteristics, there must be a consensus worldwide throughout the scientific community on how to approach and implement this process.

As a nurse, I can educate patients on the potential the CRISPR holds for future generations who might not have to suffer from genetic diseases such as Huntington's disease and BRCA related breast cancer but I must let them know that we are unfortunately still a ways off before CRISPR becomes a static factor in human gene editing and reproduction.

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·Making permanent changes to embryos, or creating designer babies, is considered risky experimentation as there is too much unknown about the effects of accidental genetic edits, the genetics of embryo and fetus development, and the long-term health consequences (Harris & Darnovsky, 2016).

·Ethical gray area genetic editing for medical purposes and enhancement purposes i.e. height or skin color (Harris & Darnovsky, 2016).

·Intense debate on which qualities that could be edited out by CRISPR is considered a disability or a source of human diversity, i.e. deafness or Asperger's (Kahn, 2015).

·Minor mistakes can occur and CRISPR can become a harmful mutation i.e. mutagenic chain reaction that speeds up the production of mutated species or a cancer-causing mutation affecting a human during test on mice (Kahn, 2015).

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•Fast, simple, and cheap process in which CRISPR can edit a gene in a matter of days (Kahn, 2015).

•Can potentially edit out fatal disorders such as cystic fibrosis and Huntington's disease as they depend on a mutated single gene (Harris & Darnovsky, 2016).

•Currently being used on agriculture to grow crops that are more pest and drought resistant (Kahn, 2015).

•CRISPR can allow better images of complex chromosomes and the organization of the nucleus of some cells (Hsu, Lander, & Zhang, 2014).

•SHERLOCK, a CRISPR tool, could detect antibiotic resistant genes, identify cancer mutations, and read human genetic information from a saliva sample (Broad Institute, 2017).