Tag: study

US scientists have genetically modified human embryos

A team of scientists from Oregon have performed the first known instance of gene editing on human embryos in the US, according to MIT’s Tech Review . Shoukhrat Mitalipov from Oregon Health and Science University and his team have reportedly corrected defective genes that cause inherited diseases in “a large number of one-cell embryos” using CRISPR . Mitalipov refused to comment on the results of the project, but some of his collaborators already confirmed them to the publication. Up until now, reports about human-related gene editing usually come from outside the US. China, in particular, hasn’t been holding back when it comes to CRISPR experimentation. Scientists from the country were the first to use the technique on human embryos to repair a gene that causes fatal blood disorder. A team of oncologists from Sichuan University also conducted the first CRISPR human trial on a patient suffering from an aggressive form of lung cancer. In the US, Congress blocked clinical trials that involve genetically modifying human embryos. The practice raises a lot of ethical concerns, after all, with critics being especially worried that it could lead to designer babies. The National Academy of Sciences issued a report in early 2017 endorsing human germline modification, though, and that’s exactly what Mitalipov’s group did. Modifying an embryo to eradicate heritable diseases is called “germline engineering, ” because the child born from that embryo will pass on the changes with his or her germ (egg or sperm) cells. We won’t find out if that’s true with Mitalipov’s study, because it was never meant to be a clinical trial. The team didn’t allow the embryos to develop for more than a couple of days, and they were never meant to be implanted into a womb. What we’ve found out, however, is that it’s possible to use CRISPR to edit embryos without causing an error called “mosaicism.” In previous attempts by Chinese scientists, CRISPR caused an editing error wherein the DNA changes they made were only taken up by some, not all, of the cells the embryos developed. The Oregon group managed to avoid that problem by injecting CRISPR segments — DNA segments used to cut out unwanted genes — and sperm cells into the eggs at the same time. It’s unclear what illnesses were involved exactly, but they used sperm donated by subjects with various inheritable diseases. One of the scientists familiar with the study told Tech Review : “It is proof of principle that it can work. They significantly reduced mosaicism. I don’t think it’s the start of clinical trials yet, but it does take it further than anyone has before.” The team’s results are still pending publication, so we’ll likely hear more details about the study in the future. Source: MIT Technology Review

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US scientists have genetically modified human embryos

Researchers will attempt to ‘reanimate’ a corpse with stem cells

Brain death may no longer be a life sentence if one Philadelphia-based biomedical startup has its way. The company, Bioquark, plans to initiate a study later this year to see if a combination of stem cell and protein blend injections, electrical nerve stimulation, and laser therapy can reverse the effects of recent brain death. They’re literally trying to bring people back from the dead. “It’s our contention that there’s no single magic bullet for this, so to start with a single magic bullet makes no sense. Hence why we have to take a different approach, ” Bioquark CEO, Ira Pastor, told Stat News . As Pastor told the Washington Post last year, he doesn’t believe that brain death is necessarily a permanent condition, at least to start. It may well be curable, he argued, if the patient is administered the right combination of stimuli, ranging from stem cells to magnetic fields. The resuscitation process will not be a quick one, however. First, the newly dead person must receive an injection of stem cells derived from their own blood. Then doctors will inject a proprietary peptide blend called BQ-A into the patient’s spinal column. This serum is supposed to help regrow neurons that had been damaged upon death. Finally, the patient undergoes 15 days of electrical nerve stimulation and transcranial laser therapy to instigate new neuron formation. During the trial, researchers will rely on EEG scans to monitor the patients for brain activity. This isn’t the first time that Bioquark has attempted this study. Last April, the company launched a nearly identical study in Rudrapur, India. However, no patients enrolled and the study wound up getting shut down that November by the Indian government over clearance issues with India’s Drug Controller General. Bioquark is reportedly nearing a deal with an unnamed Latin American country to hold a new trial later this year. Whether the treatment will actually work is an entirely different matter. Bioquark admits that it has never actually tested the regimen, even in animals, and the various component treatments have never themselves been applied to brain death. They’ve shown some promise in similar cases like stroke, brain damage and comas but never actually Lazarus-ing a corpse. “I think [someone reviving] would technically be a miracle, ” Dr. Charles Cox, a pediatric surgeon at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, told Stat News . “I think the pope would technically call that a miracle.” Source: Stat News

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Researchers will attempt to ‘reanimate’ a corpse with stem cells

CRISPR gene-editing approved for first human trials

A federal ethics and biosafety panel has approved the first ever human trials of the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technique. Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania aim to modify the immune system “T cells” in patients, helping them better fight off several kinds of cancer. The work will be funded by the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, founded earlier this year by tech billionaire Sean Parker. While the federal ethics panel nod was a big hurdle, researchers still need approval from the FDA and the hospitals conducting the studies before they can start. CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing has never been tried on humans, so early studies will focus on the safety and efficacy of the tech. Scientists will remove T cells from up to 15 patients with three types of cancer: multiple melanoma, melanoma and sarcoma. The cells will be modified with CRISPR so that they can fight the malignant cells normally, then reinserted back into the patient. The trial will take place at MD Anderson Cance Center in Texas, USC San Francisco and Penn. Sean Parker with human genome pioneer Craig Venter The technology holds a vast amount of promise in medicine — if a patient lacks a gene that makes them more susceptible to cancer or other diseases, it can simply be edited back in. Scientists also believe that it could be used to permanently eliminate diseases like Down syndrome or Sickle-Cell Anemia . If embryonic cells are “repaired, ” the recipient can never pass on a genetic disease to his offspring. However, the technique is controversial, and scientists fear it could cause unintended side effects. Scientists in China used CRISPR on human embryos to repair a gene that causes a fatal blood disorder. The technique worked on half the embryos, but failed on the other half. As a result, the team called off the study, calling it “too immature.” Nevertheless, scientists on the federal panel that gave the go-ahead for the Penn State trials were enthused, calling the study “exciting.” The decision means that CRISPR-Cas9 tech will be used even earlier on humans than expected — a company called Editas Medicine said it would hold the first trials to treat blindness in 2017. Via: Techcrunch Source: Stat News

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CRISPR gene-editing approved for first human trials

Password complexity rules more annoying, less effective than lengthy ones

Few Internet frustrations are so familiar as the password restriction . After creating a few (dozen) logins for all our Web presences, the use of symbols, mixed cases, and numbers seems less like a security measure and more like a torture device when it comes to remembering a complex password on a little-used site. But at least that variety of characters keeps you safe, right? As it turns out, there is some contrary research that supports both how frustrating these restrictions are and suggests it’s possible that the positive effect of complexity rules on security may not be as great as long length requirements. Let’s preface this with a reminder: the conventional wisdom is that complexity trumps length every time, and this notion is overwhelmingly true. Every security expert will tell you that “Supercalifragilistic” is less secure than “gj7B!!!bhrdc.” Few password creation schemes will render any password uncrackable, but in general, length does less to guard against crackability than complexity. A password is not immune from cracking simply by virtue of being long—44,991 passwords recovered from a dump of LinkedIn hashes last year were 16 characters or more. The research we describe below refers specifically to the effects of restrictions placed by administrators on password construction on their crackability. By no means does it suggest that a long password is, by default, more secure than a complex one. Read 13 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Password complexity rules more annoying, less effective than lengthy ones

First a baby, now 14 adults “functionally cured” of HIV

Earlier this month, doctors announced that a baby had been cured of an HIV infection . Now, using a similar technique, it appears that 14 adults have likewise been successfully treated for the disease. The trick, say the scientists, is to tackle the infection early. The research was conducted by Asier Sáez-Cirión of the Pasteur Institute and his results now appear in the open source journal PLOS Pathogens . His team analyzed 70 people with HIV who had been treated by combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) just a short time after infection, a range spanning 35 days to 10 weeks. This is much sooner than people are normally treated. And in fact, these patients, called the Visconti Cohort , were all diagnosed with HIV early (and by chance) when they turned up at hospitals to be assessed for other conditions. The cohort stuck to the antiretrovirals (ARVs) for an average of three years, during which time the drugs kept the virus in check (they do not eradicate HIV from the body). Eventually, all of the patients stopped taking the ARVs for various reasons (personal choice, different drug protocols, etc.). Normally, HIV will return when patients stop taking their ARVs. But this time, something interesting happened. The authors of the study described it this way: We identified 14 HIV patients (post-treatment controllers [PTCs]) whose viremia remained controlled for several years after the interruption of prolonged cART initiated during the primary infection. That’s roughly one in ten of the patients , a group that included four women and 10 men. On average, they were off the medication for seven years. It’s important to note that the patients still have the HIV infection. Also, they’re not ” supercontrollers ” (the

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First a baby, now 14 adults “functionally cured” of HIV