CRISPR
Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeat, better known as CRISPR is a genome editing method that has been shown to be faster, more accurate and more efficient than other genome editing methods. This new technology has scientists enthusiastic and very excited about how it can be applied to the immune system, the CRISPR arrays allow bacteria to “remember” viruses which allows for those viruses to be detected and eliminated quickly. While there are many scientific advantages to CRISPR we have to also think about the ethics of what is being done. DNA is being changed, this technology can be applied for therapeutic purposes such as trying to prevent a child from inheriting a disease that both of their parts are homozygous for, but the problem lies in where do when do we stop. Bioethicists are nervous that if we start using this technology at all it could lead to being used for “enhancement” purposes. Enhancement purposes relates to those “designer babies”. Is it ethical to be able to hand select traits that you want to see in you babies? Is it ethical to only allow those with money or power to alter the DNA of their babies? There are so many difficult ethical questions tied up with this idea of DNA editing and there probably will never be a definitive answer as to these questions.
I included a diagram I liked from one of the articles I found and I thought it helped to bring out the “real” science of CRISPR. It helped me to think of it more as a scientific and biological process over just the idea of designer babies.
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