Subject: Re: [permaculture] Crisper gene technology - are there
Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2016 21:35:57 -0700
Dredging up my old career as a geneticist:
On the positive side, the materials used in CRISPR technology come from
bacteria, so the source organisms are very familiar, found everywhere, not
endangered, and well understood. It allows extremely precise targeting of
specific gene sequences, making it much more accurate than the restriction
enzymes commonly used in genetic engineering.. Restriction enzymes clip DNA
at a very limited number of places, so when a geneticist uses them to cut out
a gene, they get other gene sequences along with the target gene that then
go into the production system and the final product. From that point of view,
CRISPR is much more efficient, predictable, and carefully targeted.
Also, since the changes are permanent, we know more about what’s being
released into the environment. With the old tech, as the organism loses the
new inserted gene, it turns into something new and even less predictable,
sort of a chimera that is half engineered and half randomly mutated. I’d
rather have the GMO stay the way it was designed.
On the negative side: the same greedy, ignorant, shortsighted criminals who
brought you Roundup Ready and terminator genes will use CRISPR to make
products that we don’t need and that will have all kinds of unforeseen
negative consequences, just like the old genetic engineering techniques. It’s
not the tech that’s the problem, it’s the people who use it, and their bosses
who make them do stupid things with it.
I don’t know what to make of the talk of altering the human genome. That was
the scare-mongering rumor passed about when genetic engineering first
appeared in the 1970’s, and it’s still prohibited by the Asilomar agreement,
AFAIK. But now the scientists themselves are talking about doing it, not just
opponents of the process. The wikipedia article says that 4 labs are looking
into modifying human embryos. Too bad those embryos don’t have a voice in the
decision.
One of the major CRISPR researchers, Jennifer Duodna, has a very clear video
on the technique, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuAxDVBt7kQ
and a TED talk as well. How bizarre that her surname ends in “DNA.”
As with so much new tech, it’s exciting and depressing at the same time.