{"id":233889,"date":"2020-11-02T09:31:37","date_gmt":"2020-11-02T15:31:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=233889"},"modified":"2020-11-02T13:13:01","modified_gmt":"2020-11-02T19:13:01","slug":"ethically-problematic-crispr-gene-editing-changes-embryos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/ethically-problematic-crispr-gene-editing-changes-embryos\/","title":{"rendered":"Ethically problematic Crispr gene-editing technology causing unexpected problems in embryos"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Researchers behind a study<\/a>\u00a0published Thursday in the journal Cell found that using the Crispr gene-editing technology in human embryos caused unintended and unwanted chromosomal changes, showing that the ethically problematic research may cause more harm than good.<\/p>\n

The study focused on attempts to use Crispr to repair a gene that causes hereditary blindness. Forty human embryos were created for the study, using the sperm of a man who has hereditary blindness caused by a mutation on the EYS gene.\u00a0Crispr-Cas9<\/a> was used to cut the father’s DNA at the site of the gene mutation that scientists wanted to correct. A Crispr-Cas9 enzyme was then injected into 37 of the embryos, with three embryos used as controls.\u00a0However, the use of Crispr caused the elimination of large sections of chromosomes or entire chromosomes altogether in half of the embryos.<\/p>\n

Dieter Egli, assistant professor of developmental cell biology at Columbia University and the study’s senior author, called it “a very adverse outcome,” but also said, “This study is not going to stop the field.”<\/p>\n