Human Gene Editing
Recent technological breakthroughs—most notably the development of CRISPR precision gene editing—have given scientists unprecedented power to manipulate the building blocks of life, including the human genome. Issues provides a critical platform for debating the ethics, regulation, risks, and benefits of this revolution in gene editing.
September 08, 2021
Not So Fast
CRISPR gene editing technology, developed in the early 2010s as a precise technique for altering DNA, has inspired a plethora of books—not to mention articles, reports, documentaries, and policy debates—and they keep… Read More
All Posts in this Collection
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September 01, 2021
We Haven’t Really Cracked the Code of Life
To say that scientists now understand life’s “code” is a stretch. So, from the very title of Walter Isaacson’s latest biography, The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of … Read More
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December 09, 2020
An Elusive Consensus
A few months into my medical training, I heard Fred Sanger, the Nobel prize-winning biochemist, describe a miracle—DNA sequencing in his lab—and Ray White, a pioneer in human genetics, excitedly reveal the… Read More
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September 09, 2020
The Top Eight Nanometers: A Review of Human Nature on PBS
If you are interested in (or teach) the implications of contemporary genetics, you will want to watch the Nova documentary Human Nature, which will premiere on PBS on Wednesday, September 9, 2020.… Read More
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Summer 2020
Risks and Rewards of Gene Editing
In reading the interview with Jennifer Doudna (Issues, Spring 2020), I was struck by her comment regarding the importance of bioethicists in developing guidelines for the management of the CRISPR… Read More
A Discussion of
“A Viable Path Toward Responsible Use”
Responses By
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April 23, 2020
“A Viable Path Toward Responsible Use”
Jennifer Doudna, a professor of chemistry and molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley, and codiscoverer of the CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing technology, served on the organizing committee of the… Read More
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Fall 2019
Expanding the CRISPR Conversation
In “Lessons From the He Jiankui Incident” (Issues, Summer 2019), Xiaomei Zhai, Ruipeng Lei, and Renzong Qiu call for a regulatory system that would involve governmental authority as well as… Read More
A Discussion of
Lessons From the He Jiankui Incident
Responses By
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July 15, 2019
Lessons From the He Jiankui Incident
He Jiankui’s announcement on November 26, 2018, that he had used CRISPR technology to alter the genes of two embryos that resulted in births shocked everyone in China, especially scientists and regulators.… Read More
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June 10, 2019
Islamic Ethical Perspectives on Human Genome Editing
The interest in exploring the interplay of genomics and Islamic ethics took an important turn at the beginning of the 1990s, when the international Human Genome Project was declared. Since then, both… Read More
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Summer 2019
CRISPR Regulation
As the debate about heritable genome editing unfolds, divergent perspectives are coming more clearly into view. Those who see it as offering little or no benefit while posing unacceptable societal risks support… Read More
A Discussion of
Human Genome Editing: Our Future Belongs to All of Us
Responses By