China’s claim of using gene-editing to create the World’s first designer babies have stirred outrage in the scientific world. The researchers fear that it will stall their efforts to translate gene-editing technology into safe treatments for genetic diseases.
He Jiankui is a Stanford and Rice University-trained physicist and claims to have used CRISPR-Cas9 to delete the embryos’ CCR5 gene (C-C motif chemokine receptor 5), which is linked to resistance to HIV infection and the twins were born a few weeks ago with innate immunity to HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
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| He Jiankui |
In 2010, when Jiankui was a Rice University student, he already published a paper on details about gene-editing using the bacterial immune system CRISPR. It was well before Geneticist Jennifer Doudna co-invented the groundbreaking current technology for editing genes, called CRISPR-Cas9.
He currently works at the Southern University of Science and Technology of China in Shenzhen and has posted videos to YouTube about his editing techniques. The research is not yet published in a peer-reviewed journal and is, however, yet to be verified by outside scientists and researchers.
The news stunned the scientist and researchers all over the globe as they prepare to gather in Hongkong for the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing from November 27-29, 2018. David Baltimore, Nobel laureate and chair of the organizing committee said, “I don’t know the details.”
“We don’t know what will be said,” when He speaks at a session on human embryo editing on Tuesday, November 27, 2018.
There are two main issues with the existing gene-editing technique if used to create ‘designer babies’ in the real world. The first is mosaicism, in which the edited gene does not make it way into every cell of the embryo and second are off-target effects, where other parts of the genome may get deleted accidentally, and the consequences remain unknown.
Before genome editing is used as medical treatment, it is essential that the issues of mosaicism and off-target effects are resolved. Long-term follow-up of babies who have had gene-editing done is needed to know about long-term effects.
It is also unclear that why this particular gene was editing in the twins, but reports coming out of China suggest that the father was HIV positive, but his infection was under control and mother was HIV negative. The scientists also fail to understand that why he chose the HIV gene for editing, as there already exist proven treatments to prevent HIV-positive parents from infecting their children.
There are also specific risks of having a disabled CCR5 gene, which includes a higher risk of West Nile virus infection and dying from Influenza.
The summit’s organizing committee issued a statement Monday saying they had only just learned of He’s research in Shenzhen, China. “Whether the clinical protocols that resulted in the births in China conformed with the guidance” of leading scientific bodies for conducting clinical trials of heritable genome editing “remains to be determined,” the statement said. “We hope that the dialogue at our summit further advances the world’s understanding of the issues surrounding human genome editing. Our goal is to help ensure that human genome editing research is pursued responsibly, for the benefit of all society.”
Meanwhile, Chinese officials have condemned He’s research and strongly oppose the use of gene-editing technology in humans. gene-edited babies are prohibited in China. The Ethical Guiding Principles for the Research of Human Embryonic Stem Cell which was published by the Chinese government in 2003 states that scientists are allowed to conduct genetic editing to human embryos only for research purposes, but the time for their in-vitro breeding shall not exceed 14 days from the date of fertilization or nucleus transplant.
Here is a YouTube video showing He giving information about the twins
