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Tuesday, 14 July 2020

Lulu and Nana!




Have you ever heard names of Lulu and Nana. They are GMO babies. Yeah, you read it right. Lulu and Nana were born in October 2018. The world was Amused by Chinese biophysicist He Jiankui's attempt to use CRISPR technology to modify human embryos and make them resistant to HIV, which led to the birth of twins Lulu and Nana.

CRISPR is a technique that allows scientists to make nano edits to any DNA by altering its sequence.
When using CRISPR, you may be trying to kick the ass of a gene by making it inactive, or trying to perform specific modifications, such as introducing or removing a specific piece of DNA.

Story behind Lulu and Nana

Lulu and Nana's parents were victims of HIV+ve, Mr. and Mrs. Mark were desperate to have a baby but they were restrained because they didn't want to pass this unlucky trait to their offsprings. They associated with He Jiankui, biophysicist and shared their unpleased situation. Being HIV+ve is not a very impressing thing to today's society.
While the twins' father was HIV-positive, there is already a well-established way to prevent an HIV+ve father from infecting embryos. The method called sperm washing was used by the team. The only benefit of the attempted gene modification, if proven, would have been a reduced risk of HIV infection for the twins later in life.
Embryo editing is only ethically justifiable in cases where the benefits clearly outweigh the risks. 
There is also much work still needed on governance. There have been individual calls for a moratorium on embryo editing, and expert panels from the World Health Organisation to UNESCO.Yet, no consensus has emerged.

However, our generation is not yet ready for this.  We don't need Avengers to come out of comics! 🤨


https://youtu.be/aezxaOn0efE


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