Someone who has been sleeping from the 1980’s if woken up today will be fascinated by the technological development in the field computers and AI. But behind the scene another not so discussed technological development is taking place which also has a dramatic effect on us. It’s the genetic engineering. It is not that we are doing genetic engineering from the last 50 odd years, but we have been doing it since ages, just that we did not fully understand what we were doing.
We have tinkered with many plants, fruits and animals for thousands of years. Through selective breeding we have changed many such things like changing wild banana’s to the present one’s we eat. The selective breeding has given us the pet dogs and cats. There are so many examples in agriculture. It is only recently we have unraveled the mystery of DNA, the code of life that controls our lives. All the required information and instruction is coded in the molecules. If we change the instruction then we can change the host being. In the beginning scientists exposed plants with radiation to cause mutation in DNA code. They wanted to get a useful variation of a plant. Then the scientists inserted DNA snippets into plants, bacteria and animals to research in the field of medicine, agriculture and sometimes just to experiment. The first genetically engineered animal was the mice in 1974.
In the 1980’s things started getting commercial, with the first patent being given to a genetically engineered microbe that could absorb oil. The first genetically engineered food to reach the market was the flavr savr tomato in 1994. These tomatoes had a longer shelf life as it had an extra gene which protected it from the rotting enzyme. The GM food era had started with its many controversies and debates. The journey to human engineering started in the 1990’s. In order to treat maternal infertility, genetic information from 3 different humans was used. Such children were the first humans to have 3 genetic parents. Today we have fast growing salmons, extra meaty pigs, featherless chickens and many others. Even fluorescent zebra fish is available for the home aquarium.
But genetic engineering was highly complicated and expensive and time consuming. But a revolutionary change in technology happened in the creation of CRISPR. Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. This technology reduced the cost factor by 99 percent. Experiments which used to take years can now be done in weeks. It has the potential to change the future of humanity for ever- from designer babies to ending diseases to everlasting youth.
Bacteria and viruses are deadly enemies among themselves since the beginning of life. Bacteriophages hunt for bacteria and in the ocean can kill 40 percent of them in a day. These phages insert their own genetic code into the bacteria and use them as a factory. The bacteria will fail to resist because it is too weak to protect them. But sometimes it may survive and only in such a case can they launch the most potent antivirus system. The bacteria in such cases store a part of the virus DNA in what is called CRISPR. When the bacteria get attacked again then it releases a protein from the stored data called CAS9. This protein on entering the phage scans its molecular data and then when it finds a 100 percent match it cuts it out making it useless against bacteria.
How is this information important to humans? The scientists found out that the CRISPR can be programmed. Just give it a copy of DNA you wish to program and put it in a living cell. It was a cheap and easy way to edit living cell and target a particular DNA sequence. It works for every type of cells ranging from micro organisms to humans. Now more precise tools than CRISPR are being created. This has the potential to cure deadly diseases like HIV and cancer but for this further research and refinement is required. A single incorrect letter in your DNA can cause about 3000 genetic diseases. If things go as planned then in a couple of decades thousands of diseases can be cured.
These uses of CRISPR live and die with the body, but it has the potential to make genetically engineered humans- designer babies. This will make a gradual but irreversible change in the genetic code. Humans already posses the means to edit human genome and it has been attempted twice by Chinese scientists. They were partially successful in their second attempt but it also gave a realization that there are enormous technical challenges in genome editing. We are now just like the computers of the eighties. Once this is successful then this code can be passed on through reproduction and will lead to the complete change in the gene pool of humans.
There is moral and ethical debate on its consequences. But once the technology is advanced enough and produces the first genetically engineered baby then the doo it will open cannot be closed any more. With this temptation will grow. The ultimate first baby with everything perfect and will remain perfect. No disease, perfect metabolism, high intelligence, perfect body, beautiful, choice of hair color, eye, muscular body, the list can be endless. Further advancement can lead to the solution to the biggest fear of man- aging and death. Though this can get generations to reach that stage or we may never reach that stage. We may find that at the end some things cannot be modified.
Everything can be positive but there can be negative consequences also. Imagine rogue scientists of rogue countries creating genetically engineered perfect soldiers. Rogue leaders using it to force submission of it subjects and creating a totalitarian society. Such things are far in to the future to haunt us now. But the future generations will have to decide on its course when genetic engineering is developed enough to cause concern about its use.
