Awesome I miss Fringe can't wait for someone to start real life episodes going again
Awesome I miss Fringe can't wait for someone to start real life episodes going again
Porcupine man crashing a plane!
Bank robber trapped in the bank wall!
Heh, I'm on a re-watch with my girlfriend, and we're watching the bank robber episode at this very moment.
Am I the only one who thinks of the first episodes of Fringe and instantly wonders about some weird bio-terrorism?
You wanna watch ReGenesis for that!
watch Utopia for that :P
How about that one with the exploding heads
Nah man. Glow-in-the-dark construction workers!
[deleted]
I believe the porcupine man with the crashing plane was the pilot.
Or butterflies with razor blades for wings.... seems fun. Let's get rollin.
I miss my Finger can't wait to regrow it.
Didn’t some guy do that for his brother using something called extra cellular matrix? It was a guy who lost his finger in a model airplane accident.
Edit Found a link: https://humanlimbregeneration.com/man-regrows-finger-tip-with-pigs-bladder
It's got to suck losing a finger but the worst part of that has to be explaining model airplane accident to people.
Just say model really quietly
Just say plane it's not a lie you just don't have to say what type of plane.
I cut the tip of my thumb off one time super glued it back on and it stayed just a scar now
Gecko hair does that
Fifteen minutes could save you fifteen fingers or more!
John Noble is at the comic can you I'm going to in December. I almost died from excitement when they announced him.
It would appear that Bioshock will become a documentary. Rapture, here we come!
A. Pardon my expression of hatred for a pet peeve but no work of fiction can become a documentary even if the events happen exactly as predicted, look up the definition of a documentary
B. I've actually toyed with the idea of building some kind of city like that once I got the money but not with a name like that and keeping government out of innovation for the opposite reason (not due to fear of regulation or whatever but fear of co-option by the military)
Fair enough on A. I've always felt "meh" on that being a term, anyway.
And B... would be badass.
Can't wait. That game turned me onto Ayn Rand. It's a shame Infinity was so bad with the extremely hamfisted shoehorning of political ideology, repetitive combat and boring characters.
Which one do you want to see?
I'll try to make it.
Big cuddly porcupine
Unfortunately it's less likely to be cool and more likely to be a pandemic.
Don't have to outrun the monsters just have to outrun you
I doubt developing catgirls are high on the list of priorities of our esteemed scientific community, so we might as well take matters into our own paws.
Edit: removed a bad pun
Edit 2: reinstated the pun by demand
[deleted]
I am not paying alimony to a god damn cat.
Catgirls turn into Cat Ladies.
No, because they'll be genetically modified to always be eighteen.
That actually sounds like it could be a good dystopian sci-fi anime plot, a world where anime's so popular that a perma-18 catgirl slave race was created and now one brave girl must rise up from among them and lead a revolution for all of her kind who dare to dream of something better than just being someone's "waifu" or whatever. I don't know, you get the idea of where I'm going with this, 1/3 anime cliche deconstruction, 1/3 Orphan Black, 1/3 X-Men
Maybe her supressed super reflexes and cat powers work and she's super ninja.
That could work for a "chosen one", especially if you want to push the superhero angle I implied by my X-Men comparison
I swear I've read an extremely similar idea from a comment on KYM.
I just finished a book called The Windup Girl that you might like.
...but if we don't get a whole fuckton of fan service as well, there's no point.
There would be fan service but it'd be self-aware fan service as in the show knows (to the metaphorical extent shows can know things) you're expecting it and/or it'd be Roddenberryed in (what I mean by that is Gene Roddenberry snuck what was at the time kinda PG-13 material in certain TOS episodes as a distraction to get the episode's socially unpopular moral past the radar and I'd do similar things)
I want to see a realistic picture of a cute cat girl.
I thought this was something I wanted but with the future drawing closer I'm concerned.
Best I can do is cat man
Put the pun back right now damn it.
Edit: Worth it, thanks papi
*right meow
I'm doing my undergrad rn but in 10 years I gotchu fam
fuck catgirls, lets make us some pokemon
The Furry community is working hard to make Anthropomorphic animals a reality.
Nekopara IRL
On a semi-related note, the Nekopara OVA is coming out next month.
From an ethical standpoint, everything's fucked and I think we should just end civilization already.
From a weeb standpoint I'm already writing down names for her.
CRISPR researcher here.
This is absolutely overblown. Nobody will be able to do this on their own.
CRISPR isn’t as modular as people might think and requires tens of thousands of dollars as well as years of expertise to accomplish.
If you don’t have that, the most you will accomplish is severely mutating cells, and that isn’t a cause for concern more than exposing cells to toxins is. And if you are worried about superbacteria or superviruses, none of those are made with CRISPR anyway. Those are more easily done with plasmids. CRISPR is famous because of what it does to mammalian cells and even that is still hard.
When designing CRISPR, you are limited by the PAM sites that cas9 can recognize. These are NGG sequences that need to be edited and ablated so that CRISPR stops cutting once the desired edit is made.
You need to sift through guides by their on and off target scores, and not choose the ones that might cause coding or splicing changes when you ablate the site. You need to make sure off target locations minimally target other genes and are not on the same chromosome as your target gene so that it doesn't prevent breeding to allow for rescue of genotype elsewhere.
For specific edits you might be stuck with only 3 or even just 1 guide options that have really crappy accuracy and chances of success, like about 60% match.
You need to choose an insertion site for a large gene that makes sense and won't interfere with other expression. The larger the gene you are trying to insert, the more nonspecific recognition and bad insertions with internal deletions you get. Even with a single point mutation as a goal and around 100bp homology, roughly 40% of attempts on embryos with the most effective method will have garbage rearrangements. Now imagine what happens when your ssODN is 6000bp, the size of most genes worth doing HDR on.
And if you want your new gene to express the way you want you need carefully edit close to the transcription start site.
Certain expressive effects such as conditionals would require multiple rounds of editing and animal breeding.
Even after all this you would need to QC that cutting is actually happening using a surveyor assay and a genomic DNA precipitation and PCR and Sanger sequencing.
Depending on the type of cell you are editing, you would need to vary your transfection methods, with microinjection, electroporation, lipofectamine, etc. You would need to generate kill curves with selection antibiotics for every cell line you are trying to isolate, or use an expensive FACS machine to sort by fluorescence. Not every cell line survives each method and you would need to do a battery of experiments first just to determine what method to use.
You would need an expensive biosafety hood to culture cells and select them and expand them, and do it under sterile conditions to avoid contamination that could easily destroy your work.
And then after all this you still need to verify that you got the right cells by doing genomic PCR, RNAseq, qPCR, morphological analysis, etc, and store cells in liquid nitrogen. You need to examine 10-20 off target sites individually with sequencing.
If doing it on stem cells you would need a separate room and hood and the expertise to differentiate cells without killing them.
When picking colonies and if doing it on embryos you would need to be able to handle pipettes and needles with surgical precision with less than 20um of jitter in your hands.
On top of all this, it takes 6 months to do something like this for a single edit. If you wanted to generate mad scientist material monsters it would take even a whole team of scientists their whole lives to accomplish that.
Even the most effective method, embryo microinjection, after all these rigid controls, has only a 10% success rate. For cell lines, I made 600 concurrent attempts just to delete one gene and only got 4 successes for a knockout. If you are talking HDR, we couldn't even get a single point mutation to manifest in a cell line we wanted and had to shift to embryos instead of immortalized cell lines after over 1200 attempts.
Without all this people aren't going to successfully make any edits that matter. By the time anyone got anywhere on their own we would all be dead of old age anyway. All these people injecting themselves aren't doing it right. You would need an engineered cas9 with much better specificity to do in vivo CRISPR. Barring using CRISPR-gold, which nobody but Berkeley can use, the best way to do CRISPR is to ex vivo culture before transplanting back in.
The idea that anyone and everyone can do this is frankly laughable and an example of terrible science literacy in the media.
Sometimes I think I'm smart but then stuff like this reminds me how useless and stupid I actually am.
you can be like this too if you put in the work and time
Thanks mate I hope
So, i've analyzed your post history and am sad to announce you that you'll never be a Geneticist. sorry. :/
Yeah but can he make as good of a mac n' cheese as you do? Bet he can't. Keep crushin' it, bro.
This guy CRISPS
Dude, thank you. Not just for such a thorough comment, but for spending the time, money, effort and thought into becoming trained enough to be able to give such a cogent answer in the first place.
Indeed, CRISPR is way overhyped even within the legitimate scientific community how "easy" it is. Let alone these so-called buohackers. I love how at the end of the article his simple experiment with the "DIY scientist" didn't work.
What is a DIY scientist anyway? Isn't all science DIY? Who else would do it?
Just heard a podcast from one of these wanks who injected CRISPR into his arm attempting to knock out B-actin. Good luck bro!
That kit worked fine for me, although I am currently studying biology in school. The instructions could have added some extra steps to make the likelihood of success a bit higher. At the end of the day, the kit was $100 and pretty boring. Just cool to have actually gotten to use CRISPR after learning about it. DIY science is either at home (which I think is a bit ridiculous) or at community wet labs. You can pay a monthly membership fee and have access to the lab. The idea behind it is actually really good IMO. If you are not researching a widespread chronic illness or something with the potential to make a profit then good luck. These community labs are typically filled with professors and biotech people who come up with some really brilliant ideas, but cannot work on them at their jobs. These places allow you to work on your own ideas and have classes everyday. Right now I am working on a project sequencing the genome of the dwarf cuttlefish and it is really a blast.
I guess I understand the concept but was struggling with the name. I have a friend who did some work with a local community lab. didn't have much good to say about it. out of curiosity, can you tell a little more about your cuttlefish project?
Yea you have a point with the name LOL. I could also imagine a ton of community labs are probably not that great. Thankfully I live in the Bay Area, so there are a ton of biotech companies who help with funding and supplies. So regarding the cuttlefish. It has been shown that cuttlefish, squid and octopus edit their RNA after transcription to allow further complexity and flexibility. Basically they are choosing this method instead of genome evolution, which takes much longer and cannot be changed actively. Just so happens that the majority of RNA edits are occurring in the neuronal tissue. They think this is the reason that the squid, octopus and cuttlefish are so much smarter than the next closest related species, which is the nautilus. The nautilus has very few of these RNA edits and is not much more than a floating snail. In my project we are first sequencing the genome (DNA), then we have to sequence the transcriptome (RNA) and then we can see where the differences are occurring. Once we have a good idea of where the edit sites are we can try to figure out which protein is being made when the RNA is not edited versus the protein that is made after the edits. We are also going to raise some cuttlefish and see what changes they make as the water changes from cold to warm. Cephalopods are actually increasing in numbers as the ocean increases in temperature. They think this is because they can adapt using these RNA edits. If you have anymore question feel free to ask. :)
So when can I CRISPR myself to become smarter? /s
Interesting stuff. Glad you're able to make the community lab thing work.
I don't think CRISPR can work to edit RNA but humans actually also use the same technique of editing RNA in our brain just to a much smaller degree. Chimps, however, do not edit RNA in brain tissue. Maybe we have already begun to unlock the secrets of the kraken intelligence?!
That sucks that you found the kit to be pretty boring. I've used this kit http://www.the-odin.com/diy-crispr-kit/ But it shouldn't deter you from using it. I myself am a CRISPR researcher at Harvard, and I found it to be very comprehensive and a great learning tool for all levels of curiosity. This kit alone may not cure cancer or eliminate pattern balding, but definitely a platform we can use to accelerate the growth of science.
I watched a PH. D. student in my professor's lab struggle with CRISPR for almost a year before he got what he needed. CRISPR is not easy to use by any stretch of imagination.
I'm jealous, you work in a really cool field. I didn't realize it took so long to perform the edits.
The RadioLab CRISPR episode got me really interested in possible DIY gene editing. A little further research revealed how truly complex this stuff is, and that it definitely isn't something I could feasibly do with my single semester of community college and used lab equipment in my spare bedroom.
The feeder mice at the local PetCo are safe from me, for now...
Why do people call it CRISPR? It seems like a misnomer that's even common in the scientific community. It irks me.
From what I can tell, CRISPR (the DNA repeats in prokaryotes) has nothing to do with the editing technolgy once Cas9 or its variants is applied heterologously.
The cas9 in nature is directed by RNA, which is made of two parts, the crRNA and the tracrRNA.
The crRNA stands for CRISPR RNA, as it is normally derived from the repeat region in bacteria. cas type II proteins generate crRNAs from the repeats to be fed to the silencing complex.
Even though we have begun designing custom crRNAs not naturally found in bacteria and combining crRNAs and tracrRNAs into gRNAs, the parameters of what the crRNA-like section needs to be are constant. Any of these new gRNAs would be able to be inserted into a bacterial CRISPR region like it belonged there easily, and would have the characteristics of a crRNA in terms of GC content, length, etc.
So we call the system CRISPR because we mean that the system is guided by CRISPR RNA-like guide.
There are ways to use cas9 to perform other functions as well without the guide, which is why it is important to distinguish that the system is focused on the crRNA. there are also other cas proteins that can be used and for other purposes.
Also it's just catchy.
I agree it's catchy, but I also think calling the system "CRISPR" is unnecessary and innacurate. I appreciate the semantics in the paper below (which you've probably seen). "CRISPR" is nowhere to be found except explaining the abbreviation Cas9.
(Edit: I lied, but it's not in the title or abstract) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28459452
Well if you get technical about it the system is actually called "CRISPR/cas9", indicating that it is both the CRISPR-like fragment conjugated with the cas9. "CRISPR" is just the shorthand that has entered common parlance because people like a two and a half syllable word more than saying the whole thing.
There are many instances in biology where people end up using less descriptive shorthand to refer to things. For instance, any Isothermal PCR Fragment Assembly reaction is nowadays commonly referred to as a Gibson, even though the inventor of Gibson didn't like the name and also isn't responsible for making newer versions of the reaction that differ by a lot.
Thank you for allaying my fears. Any thoughts on whether the technology will advance to the point where these things actually aee a problem within our lifetime?
Unless several key discoveries are made, it won’t happen for a long time.
The apparent accessibility of cas9 is due to the fact that it folds correctly in bacteria easily and can delivered as a plasmid. But cas9 itself has many limitations that make it hard to use.
So, we need:
1) A better cas9
We need a cas9 that is more robust that can ignore the limitations of PAM sites but is also extremely specific with almost no off target effects. Then the average joe can make use of it because then they wouldn’t need a background in bioinformatics to choose a site properly. It is either that or someone needs to design a more layman-friendly bioinformatics program that does all the heavy lifting for you so that you don't need to make executive decisions.
More accurate versions of cas9 have been engineered, but these are not native to bacteria and their folding is not able to be chaperoned. None of these are also generalized enough to be easy to understand.
This will take either directed evolution or lots of expensive protein engineering. This is being done but the process is slow.
But just having a better cas9 sequence doesn't necessarily mean we can get the sequence to produce good protein. An engineered cas9 that is idiot proof loses the flexibility of the easy plasmid form storage.
This leads us to:
2) Someone would need to design a plasmid or cell line that can generate lots of properly folded engineered cas9.
Of these two it is probably easier to drive expression in a plasmid of a few assistive proteins than it is to engineer an expressive cell line, or to add tags or cleavage sites that allow for purification in an HPLC column. But columns themselves are also expensive.
So...
3) Protein isolation technology needs to become more affordable.
We would need a cheap way of getting good modified cas9 out of these cells that have made them for us.
Currently most labs have dedicated proteomics groups that have a whole separate facility handling protein harvesting.
We need column technology to become more affordable. It's feasible that someone could downsize an industrial HPLC and create a cheaper, cruder high pressure pneumatic system to allow DIY people to harvest small batches of engineered cas9, maybe in a 1mL column rather than an industrial 200mL column.
But now just because we finally have a good protein on hand, doesn't mean we can store it properly. Cas9 is typically frozen at at least -80 in very expensive fridges or it can fall apart.
4) We would need a cas9 that can be flash frozen and stored at room temperature.
Other cas proteins besides cas9 have been able to be stored at room temperature on paper, which is something the Zhang lab has accomplished with their Zika virus paper.
5) We would also need a much better delivery system than is currently available.
As I mentioned, not all cells currently are able to accept all readily available delivery systems.
CRISPR-gold currently represents the forefront of delivery mechanisms. It uses a gold particle bound to both the ssODN and the riboprotein of cas9 and its guide. This puts the template and cutting in the same spot to vastly increase HDR rates.
Someone would have to invent either a better delivery method that you could use cheaply, or make nanoparticle assembly easier and cheaper.
6) Someone needs to design a cheap and quick kit that can quickly test for desired edits.
We need something like the Zhang lab's Zika assay to get commercialized so that people can quickly screen for whatever gene they want. A qualitative ELISA in a 96 well plate is probably good enough, but this would require that someone took the time to make this tool. Other methods are more accurate and this would be designed simply to make it so laymen can use it without a plate reader.
7) PCR machines need to be affordable.
It is currently very hard to make a PCR machine. I made one before but it took months to get it right. However, my machine was under $200 and did work. So if someone takes these components and makes a 3d printer schematic, this could happen.
8) Sterile environment technology needs to get cheaper.
Even if you can make the edits and have all the tools, you won't get anywhere if you can't nurture and protect your cells. Biosafety hoods that produce an airflow that prevents particulate matter carrying fungus or bacteria in the air from entering your workspace need to become more affordable. Since you need a very carefully engineered box to accomplish this, most people can't make it on their own.
Perhaps someone could design a 3d printed one that can be quickly assembled.
Once these 8 things are in place, we can start worrying about DIY scientists more.
Harvard CRISPR Researcher here. Whole heartedly agree with the rigor and the patience every trained scientist needs to be able to pull off CRISPR. Additionally, this kit http://www.the-odin.com/diy-crispr-kit/ is not designed to do advanced methods such as gene therapies. I find your accusations harsh and unrealistic that people that are not trained in science simply cannot do science. The mission of The ODIN or other companies that sell complete kits are to teach the masses how things work. It might be diluted down so that others can understand the concept, but it should not limit accessibility to science. I believe that EVERYONE no matter what age can do genetic engineering in their kitchen and learn the technology instead of leaving it to some "scientists".
Did you even read the article? You're just as bad as the average joes that simply read the title and posted a comment; except you felt the need to flaunt your superior knowledge. In the article it doesn't say that Susy from Lincoln, Nebraska could cook up an incredible scientific breakthrough and cure cancer. It says that it is fun to do an experiment and "feel" like you're doing something incredible. And maybe a few DIY labs with smart people in them could make some small progress, but nothing tremendous. Unless I missed something, the article wasn't implying "anyone and everyone could do this." To me it is terrible that you would feel the desire to come in here and use big words to try and show people they are beneath you. In my opinion the larger point of the article was that it is an incredible scientific breakthrough and the fact that it is so easily accessible could lead to some accidental discoveries, or more importantly teaching people and students about science and the powers of CRISPR.
Yes, I read the article. Which is why I heavily disagreed with the sensationalist nature of some of the author's claims and felt the need to say something. From the comments even just in this thread it is clear that the sensationalist nature has greatly confused the readers as to what is within the realm of possibility and scientists have a responsibility to set the record straight.
First, the article's title is literally "Mail-Order CRISPR Kits Allow Absolutely Anyone to Hack DNA". Which is false. Even with the kit, the untrained author only generated 2 colonies on his predicted antibiotic resistant plate. He then said "CRISPR is easy, anyone can do it!" and that maybe those were edited colonies.
That's false. 1-2 colonies is the number you would expect from a negative control. Bacteria can be resilient and if you put enough in a clump, even without antibiotic resistance they can form a biofilm and survive. With something like CRISPR you'd expect at least a dozen colonies before you'd feel okay about it.
He felt like he'd done something, but his CRISPR actually didn't work. He didn't recognize it because he wasn't trained. The author even put in way more effort than other people would be doing, visiting a professional facility as well as another DIY lab. And he still failed. Two failures in a row and yet he still makes the claim that "anyone can do it!" It's clearly bullshit.
The average Joe would need to buy several kits and try over the course of many weeks or even months.
Your comment that:
maybe a few DIY labs with smart people in them could make some small progress
Is just not true. There will be absolutely zero progress in DIY labs because CRISPR just isn't actually easy and takes a crazy amount of money. They will make the same amount of progress they did previously with other available methods that were also very cheap, which is basically nothing. Biology follows Eroom's law where the cost of research doubles every few years because biology isn't a field where we know all the fundamentals, unlike how the cost halves every few years in electrical engineering. The more fundamentals we discover, the more steps we need to include to do rigorous science. It doesn't matter if you are smart physicist if you don't have a collider. It doesn't matter if you are a smart biologist if you don't have a sterile environment. And if you are the average Joe it is even worse.
It's already bad enough that people are scared of GMOs and that the scam of organic food has overtaken the market. We don't need people fearmongering that DIY CRISPR is actually going to get anywhere. And we shouldn't be scamming people with premade DIY CRISPR kits that actually require a lot of expertise to even just induce antibiotic resistance.
so easily accessible
It isn't accessible, and it isn't any more accessible than plasmid-based bacterial editing. For bacterial modification, it's actually much cheaper to order a plasmid without any cas9 in it from IDT for a hundred bucks or something and do some cloning with a series of $20 primers than it is to do the much more complex CRISPR yourself. The author made some silly claims like how a knockout only costs $100. This number assumes you already have a lab with equipment and is just accounting for the raw materials on top of that. It also accounts for only the actual day of editing and none of the generation costs for custom ssODNs or guides, any of the cell culture and maintenance, or any of the QC or downstream processes that span months of full time labour. It cost me $6000 just to sequence my potential colonies, a tiny part of the process for the very easiest form of CRISPR that is of the absolute lowest difficulty.
It doesn't matter how "accessible" the cas9 itself is if you don't have any of the thousand-dollar equipment to make use of it. The net accessibility of even simple research is still zero.
teaching people and students about science and the powers of CRISPR.
This is the only part that is true, but we shouldn't be hyping it up any more than we hype up children's science kits. And nobody is ever going to get anywhere with a children's science kit.
You didn't factor in the community cooperation aspect of this
My work is a community effort between Bayer, the Broad Institute, Harvard, Mass General Hospital, my lab, and the Zhang lab.
I seriously doubt a bunch of community DIY guys can pull off what we struggled with with like fifty phds
[deleted]
wouldn't then need to be like really huge to lift off your body + the huge muscles necessary to move them ? it's easier to make your pecker glow in the dark :))
Sign me up for the glow in the dark pecker. I could make so much money as a side show.
Also good for peeing in the dark
I want glow in the dark pee now. It'd be like pee-drawing in the snow, except so much cooler.
Just drink some Nuka-Cola Quantum.
+1 bottlecap
Take a multivitamin and then shine a blacklight on your dick while you pee. Viola!
I don’t know, when the light source is between you and the target it’s hard to see, I’ll just take glow stick fluid pee thanks. Hopefully I don’t have to crack my dick to activate it.
[deleted]
I'm not interested in performance with it. Just showing it off and charging people to see it.
[deleted]
What if you have to actually charge it? Plug it in...
Just make it like one of those shake flashlights.
[deleted]
Found the robot!
Please check all boxes containing street signs:
I just don't wanna run into walls during 3 am pees.
Name checks out
[removed]
Not if everyone has one
But if making a glow in the dark pecker is that easy, why would it be worth anything as a sideshow attraction?
You could make so much money as a "Helicopter" ride. Meat Spin anyone?
[removed]
You'd need to be huge unless you lost weight elsewhere like a bird, lighter bones, thinner limbs, less fat.
Or increase strength
And that raises the overall weight. The way to get around that is to spread the weight out. The Quetzalcoatlus is a good example of this. To over come it's weight it has a wing span of 36 feet and was 18 feet long. Now it's estimated weight is 250 lbs. You wouldnt have to be that large as the average males weight is 180 lbs. But you would still be extremely tall, extreme thin with a massive wingspan. That also includes having this bones and almost no body fat just muscle.
[deleted]
I wouldn't say the man is mini but that dino is massive.
That's got to be a fan drawing of the game ARK. You have to knock it out then shove berries up it's ass to tame it.
Would it be any different with specific wing types (like different kinds of bird-like wings or ones like bats or dragons have) or if the wannabe-flier has a different (than the average) body type starting out?
Wings types do play a part no doubt. However a big factor from the start is body type all flying animals are light weight compared to their size. It's like making a boat sure you can make one out of lead but it's got to have enough of a volume to weight ratio so they are bouyant. it also depends on. The kind of flight you want gliding etc would make a difference as well. Gliding would have larger wings, require less energy, and can carry more weight but not be very Dexterous. Humming bird wings require alot more energy but have good speed, dexterity, and require a lot less space, but carry alot less weight.
As I said, I was thinking more about, like, bird/angel wings (and all the various types thereof) vs. insect/fairy wings vs. bat/dragon wings (because if I could have any kind of wings regardless of body requirements, I'd have one of the latter two sorts because, as much fun as the idea of conning fundamentalist Christians by pretending to be an angel of the Lord is, bird wings seem like they'd require a lot of upkeep and shed feathers everywhere)
I was also asking about body type/size because A. I saw another comment suggesting larger size might help which seems to contradict yours and B. I am a curvy/fat woman who's always wanted to fly if possible (e.g. I hate how planes feel like cattle cars and even as a kid, never mind an adult, it was hard to get me off the swings)
The dust from the feathers is the worst part.
Source: I own parrots. Lots and lots of dust.
Also the other comment I think you are talking about is saying a person would have to be thin and small. Which is right if you wanted to keep the same height and a relatively normal wingspan. It's all about weight to flight surface area. The heavier you are you more you need to spread that weight out and have more area for lift. It's basic aerodynamics. Also muscles are only so strong even in other species, there is an energy density limit.
Source: am and engineer with a bit of a background in aerospace. 8 years as an aerospace engineer switched to remote mining as it made alot more money with alot less work.
If you became an angel like creature you would end up very tall, very thin with almost no body fat, lean muscles, and a massive wingspan. You would also most likely have hollow bones or very very thin stick like bones. There are some cool discussions on how it would work I've found in the past.
A good example of wing size is look at hang gliders and how high they are. This is without the extra mass for the dense muscles needed to move the wings either. So even larger.
Couldn't there be ways around it like tweaking the muscles and/or bones at a deeper level
That goes beyond any kind of science in existence.
Quetzalcoatlus and pterosaurs in general also had all nearly all there muscle mass available for flight power. Its one reason birds will never be as large, since birds have large leg muscles not used in flight and birds need to those muscles to launch.
It's not that they never will it will just a large shift for them to. Some birds like humming birds have almost no leg muscles but the rest of their muscle structure is not suited for other kinds of flight.
[deleted]
Well, iirc average weight for a male is 140-160 lbs, at least for 5 feet and 8 inches.
..But that's below average height?
Anyway, the average american male age 20 and over weighs 88.3kg, or 194.7lbs and 5'9.4" At least as of 2008's National Health Statistics Reports.
Of course, people are fat as fuck, and have a lot of weight they could lose if they were optimizing for it.
[deleted]
Adding an inch doesn't increase 40 lbs.
Yeah, I just wasn't sure why you chose to use that height..
2008 is almost a decade old too, bud
That's some good math, Lou. It was what I could find quickly as an authoritative source. If you prefer, the CDC has something from 2011-2014. It's gone up a pound. Glad we got that updated measurement, makes all the difference...
That’s true.
There’s got to be another way... how about we combine our DNA with specific programmed metal alloys that allow our bodies to start growing mini half-organic jet packs?
And that's totally not going to backfire and turn us into the sort of thing we'd come up with as a villain in some alien invasion movie or whatever ;)
I think in a couple hundred years when artificial body parts are advanced enough a human might be able to replace bones and muscles with lightweight and powerful components. But it would still be obscenely expensive and difficult to replace all that mass and maintain it. Also training a human brain to recognize and actually use two new appendages like wings might not even be possible.
and then you'd be bullied by the normal boned people. and you can forget about her being on top ;)
He could give himself hollowish bones like some bird but then his bones would be quite fragile
Avian Bone Syndrome?
and make it bigger, obviously.
Still waiting for my glow in the dark plant seeds from that Kickstarter 9 years ago.
you were actually funding obama's campaign :))
How bout wolverine claws? I want those.
they can automate those, like the hidden blade in assassin's creed
[deleted]
and power armors, don't forget power armors
Just live near some steep hills and glide. Then you just need bony extrusions and taught stretched skin
going down the hill is easy anyway, it's going up that's grinding your balls
Lets be honest. Dudes will use this on themselves to enlarge their penises.
We've had GMO crops. Now get ready for GMO cocks.
[deleted]
End of the skinny jean trend...might be worth it.
Honestly, this could help the guys with abnormally small dicks. nothing is wrong with that.
And CRISPR would be effective since there will not be too many cells to affect. :)
I just want something simple, like superpowers. I'm fine with my dick size.
[removed]
Sorry to burst your bubble but most cocks are within the normal range and the vast majority of ladies think your penis is just fine.
Now you want to cure baldness and we're talking
cure baldness
you are beyond rich or dead by Big Wig.
Big wig... the notorious brother of Big Oil
Micropenises, 4 inches or less, many girls wouldn't be okay with that.
I kinda dig my thinning crown.
Its a new standard of beauty I call Roganesque
Rationality doesn't matter here. Guys will still want to be bigger.
This was actually the idea behind a sci-fi book I was trying to write at one point. It was a how-to guide about life and sex in a near-ish future where genetic modifications are the norm. It included giant dongs, futa, trans/hybrid gender mods, and a bunch of other stuff people will undoubtedly get into once this stuff becomes cheap and prevalent.
/r/furry_IRL takes on a whole new meaning.
Yeah, I can see that kind of degeneracy happening once technology enables it.
Name of the book?
Oh, Im stupid and thought write was read...
Baldness. Lots of bald guys trying to regrow their hair.
Just like that science game Foldit. Use collective intelligence and put it to work in a “game” format to solve scientific problems.
That's a very different case than giving people who know little to nothing about genetics the tools to manipulate the DNA of living organisms.
Think of the possibilities though!!!!!
Exciting times indeed.
Customized biological weapons?
That’s what I’m talking bout. What do you have in mind, exactly?
Mostly that risk. While technically exciting, probably not something to be excited for.
Very Marvel comics though, you gotta admit. Could be fun.
Customized biological weapons?
While that's going to happen, for the forseeable future it will require people to know more than a little about genetics.
And the people who would do that will be able to do it regardless of what anyone tries to do to stop them, short of nuking modern society back to the Stone Age.
"How to make your cat breathe fire like a dragon." Or "How to turn your iguana into a velociraptor"
Or "How to breed catgirls for domestic ownership"
Catgirls have rights too.
Yeah, see one of my posts further up about a hypothetical anime I want to make where the catgirls rise up (basically 1/3 anime cliche deconstruction e.g. the fanservice would either be self-aware and/or Roddenberryed into episodes with controversial morals as a distraction, 1/3 Orphan Black and 1/3 X-Men)
Also, some people might want to be catgirls themselves without any sort of weird crap attached to it (like if wings were somehow impossible with a relatively normal human body plan, I'd instead give myself not just cat ears and a tail but their "creature powers" like super-night-vision and super-reflexes as well)
I can be your catgirl for domestic ownership already... :3
[deleted]
[deleted]
Do you need to know any programming language to use a computer?
Yes. Do you know how long real programmers have studied to be able to manage computers. Now imagine something factors more complicated and tell me again how some script kiddie could do it.
CRISPR can (and I believe) will transform humanity. I hope it will be for the better, but it will also make it much easier (relatively to how complicated it would be normally) for some sick power hungry mind to send out some deadly incurable bacteria..
Regulations are worth shit, if the benefits are huge.
Well, plutonium has some huge benefits, so lets just not regulate it.. Better yet, lets give it out to kids, because you know, regulations are worth shit! Your argument is stupid..
That’s a funny analogy you used there.
Because programming, in the modern sense, is mostly done by people using several layers of abstraction and programming languages created by prior researchers and tons upon tons of community contributions.
So... Are you arguing that gene-hacking will go the same route? That with time, it will go in complexity from “genius expert” to “dedicated expert” to “dedicated amateur” to “casual amateur using a YouTube DIY guide”?
You do understand that analogies are not to be taken literally because they are analogies?
And yeah, who knows, maybe one day there will be a program on some tablet where you click a few buttons, and a syringe comes out that makes your muscles start growing or something. You don't need to know any of the dynamics below the buttons, you just press them like a good old ignorant script kiddie. Will it happen? I don't know, but I do think it is in the real of the possible..
Yes. I understand how analogies work... Is everyone this condescending on reddit lately? Was it the election arguing or something?
Anyway, yeah, my broad point was that any complex, desirable technology generally gets simplified, bit by bit, over time. There is definitely a “floor”, though, where it’s hard to make things simpler past a certain point without having at least some knowledge of what’s happening under the hood.
The real question is, then, where that floor is. It’s obvious that more simplification is possible, but outside of extreme-future sci-fi scenarios, I don’t see it being fully “push button, get full body mods” in the kind of time frame either of us are probably thinking of.
Sorry for that, bad mood here..
But with your comment I suddenly get these scary visions of a future where the young generation thinks its the "latest fasion" to do body modifications from apps, like growing a tail, getting purple eyes, etc..
If the people who work with this stuff every day, are experts with have decades of research and knowledge on the subject, are not worried. Than neither am I.
You're talking about some sci-fi level crap which is almost always farther from reality than what it would be like. No-ones ever "parked a nuke next to the White House", or "released a weaponized virus" or whatever. Both of which would likely be easier than what you're proposing.
From what I'm reading crispr seems very singular/embryo based. Is there a way for the best scientists with big funding to weaponize something on a medium/large scale.
From my (admittedly very limited) knowledge of CRISPR, it would would on any level, even living human beings.. Actually IIRC a baby already has been born with some genetic defect repaired using CRISPR (Details are hazy, but I think I read this on reddit a few months back).
Could this be weaponized? absolutely. I think CRISPR is the uranium in biomedicine.. You can do great things with it, and you can also destroy humanity. Then again, CRISPR might get us to a level so far that IF somebody were to send some deadly bacteria out there using its technology, the same technology could also make a cure in no time..
Yea I am always for the progression of science and believe the saying that it isn't intrinsically good or bad (evil). Hopefully the powerhouse countries maintain ethics and regulations/safety.
Okay so they could make deadly bacteria. I agree also we are pretty good at countering disease.
They could make mosquitoes who breed quickly and carry rabies. Doesn't show for 2 to 8 weeks. Could be devastating (no clue if they could carry it). Just making up a movie not being terribly serious.
I agree also we are pretty good at countering disease.
Well no.. We still kind of suck at it. With antibiotics failing rapidly and no new ones being made, situation is even worse..
I'm not trying to paint a dooms day picture here, but reality currently is that IF somebody were to be able to make a new disease with CRISPR, we'd be effed in the a badly.. IT won't be a doomsday device, but potentially milions could die before we could do something about it, if anything could be done at all..
Whoa we have to inject stuff. Pass.
Don't think for a moment amateurs couldn't figure it out. Some of our most prolific mathematicians and scientists have been self taught...
Some of our most prolific mathematicians and scientists have been self taught...
Surely you wouldn't mind naming some of those prolific mathematicians and scientists? I know there are a lot of areas where you can be "self taught".. I'm a self taught developer and system administrator. I've worked in the biggest data centers out there, and although the areas interest me, I'm not stupid enough to claim I could be a "prolific" mathematician or scientist. I'm also not naive enough to think that some amateur could figure out CRISPR level biotech. If they could, they wouldn't be amateurs, and they'd be working as professional scientists in universities or large companies.
But yeah, please, do name a few prolific mathematicians and scientists that are self taught, I'm curious...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_autodidacts
Outside of that, there are a number of competent AI hobbyists, chemists, etc. You can't see a 15 year old build a computer in minecraft and not think people would be smart enough to figure out how to use a gene editor.
It wouldn't be a lot of people, sure. But it wouldn't be zero, or even close, either.
I agree with your assessment that it could be dangerous, though. No clue what kind of mistakes people might make. Air-born HIV? .... yay.
[removed]
[removed]
That is a real danger, but we’re still a long ways off from that. I feel like the media has hyped up Crispr to be so much more than it actually is. It’s actually kind of become a joke in the scientific community. It’s a powerful tool, but when it comes to gene editing it sucks ass in terms of actually applying it. Both because of its own limitations and because we still don’t know nearly enough about how genetics works to start manipulating genes on an organism wide scale.
I would say don’t be too worried about it in your own lifetime.
From how I understand it, it's like editing compiled Windows executables' raw machine language using Notepad. Until we have an IDE, it's limited to tiny kludges and hacks.
(To be fair: it's also like using Game Genie to alter specific memory values, such as how many lives or how much ammo your character still has.)
Yeah, except all the really cool stuff is really well hidden behind DRM and ASLR from hell, nothing is documented, and the designer is a blind, insane idiot...
The real danger is the editing of bacterial genes to make unique and more deadly bacteria.
True. But we've gotten pretty good at editing bacterial DNA for a little while now, even before CRISPR came along.
Yeah but even if someone did do this, couldn't someone figure out how to make you immune to it?
Yes, which is why curing AIDS was so easy
ugh i hate scientific buzzkills like you
He's actually downplaying it alot. The biggest fault with crispr editing is that we don't know every single genetic marker and every dependency that relies on them. That's what makes it so hard to apply it.
in the time square
It sounds really sci-fi when you say it that way :P
"Human! Take me to the Time Square!"
"... you mean Times Square?"
Or even gorilla warfare. I saw a documentary about that over the summer in the theatre.
Or imagine someone adding a mucus binding glycoprotein to ebola to make airborn ebola.
[deleted]
You dont need it but it makes it much less complicated and accessible to non phds. Wow never heard of phd students doing viral research, is that something new? /s
Maybe in some far future. Right now an amateur is unlikely to have the expertise to design and execute an experiment that advances the field.
Making glow in the dark animals is easy. I accidentally made a fluorescent red mouse in lab. Spent 6 months optimizing breeding schemes so only the cells we study about glow.
You probably changed the embryo, not the live organism right?
Not exactly. I was using a mouse line that had a fluorescent reporter gene but I didn't know that a copy could become activated and germline transmitted to the offspring. So no, I personally didn't modify the embryo directly but yes, the embryo was affected and not an older mouse.
Breeding schemes
Yeah, probably
Since you did it twice, I think you meant DIY instead of DYI.
Unless DYI means something I'm unaware of. Do Yourself In seems like a candidate from some of the projects I've seen people attempt.
I was favoring "Do Yoga Inebriated" myself.
It's path seems a lot like that of computer technology, and judging the ability of basically anyone to make a virus or hack these days I don't want to know what could be done if instead of computer viruses people start making biological viruses.
DYI
its DIY
Guerrilla war in the future will be scary and potentially more dangerous.
This is why those who think the future will be living in massive cities are completely deluded. They're just a target-rich environment for murderous asshats.
Maybe we can genetically engineer that murderous behavior out of them. /s
Impulse control is tied to genetics, somewhat, so this isn't entirely a crazy idea.
But deleting/modifying traumatic memories would help a lot more. You can wag your finger all you like but mass murderers don't usually listen to logic or empathy.
Which is something we're already relatively sure we can do, since the early trials on animals appears to work.
Even better, reduce the traumatic memories from even happening. But how? That may take some long term effort.
I would suggest unlimited surveillance on every citizen. Cameras in every home, in every vehicle, on every street corner.
Child Protective Services would then have the legal ammunition to take anyone's kids from them, at any time, and put them in a safer home. Homes will be vetted and ranked by past video data of all citizens. Every drug you've abused, or flash of anger you've expressed, will count against you as a candidate for the child.
This is incredibly Orwellian and I'm sure a flood of people are about to tell me how I'm worse than Hitler. But this protects children, which protects the future generation of adults that will one day be running this country.
But ya I'm definitely Hitler.
No, you're not Hitler, just likely to be taken down by a tech-savvy 16-25-year-old and their love interest ;)
The great thinker, Joe Rogan posited social media will become all consuming where you can watch a person's entire lives play out from start to finish. I can't say that's a bad idea.
I enjoy his ideas, he doesn't act like anything is "too out there".
It may have to do with the alienation he experienced with his family. That kind of scenario tells you what you see on TV or what is popularly believed may be completely wrong.
The truth is out there. Doo doo dwee doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo, ding ding, whistle whistle whistle whistle.
If you like thinking about things like this (DNA modification + War/Weapons + Gangs/Shaddy Governments), then I HIGHLY recommend the novel "Change Agent" by Daniel Suarez. He writes great one-novel stories that tackle complex topics about cutting-edge tech, and the Audiobook is excellently done too.
Thanks, I really appreciate the recommendation! Need to quench my audiobook thirst
Special OPs members getting the DNA changed structurally to allow their eyes to see a night vision that animals have.
but then again it could be easy for regimes/dedicates groups/cults to develop biological weapons
This isn't true. It's very difficult to make an engineered organism which survives in more than lab conditions.
We evolved over millions of years of shit trying to do nothing more than kill and eat us, evolving just as strongly with that ends.
Natural diseases are going to remain far more deadly than lab-made ones for some time, especially without the backing of a large nation.
It's like how computer programs make computers better... Of course you will get your bad apple here and there like crakers, but in the grand scheme of things life will accelerate towards the future.
Imagine regrowing lost limbs
Hopefully that'll get people focusing on keeping the public safe from what's possible, instead of having people's safety depend on something unreliable like a lack of easy access to the materials. (It only takes one startup to make it widely available like we see here, and I explained in another comment here why that startup wouldn't be doing anything wrong by doing so.)
There's that whole power<->responsibility thing, though, and I'm not sure the general public is responsible enough.
They'll probably accomplish what you suggest, but also manage to make some seriously dangerous shit as well. While I'm stoked at what could come from DNA editing, I still think we should exercise some caution here.
so Transmetropolitan world then is what you want.
I think this is gonna end up with a bunch of people accidentally getting cancer by experimenting on their own genome instead of using HeLa cells or something.
I've read a few books about biological weapons that target people with specific genomes. It's quite an interesting field.
than GATTACA (it's a genetic code) *CRISPR
This makes me think of the genetically-engineered chameleon cats ("cheshires") from the Windup Girl.
Are you on cocaine right now?
Man I really don't want to die but can you imagine a world in which the current population of old people lives forever?
If we ever do stop aging, we will have plenty of time to find a way to reverse it as well. So no, if you live forever it will most likely not be as an old barely living husk like most people imagine. Death is curable like any disease, and I put it personally at coin flip odds that we will solve it in my lifetime.
Guerrillas in the Mist.
But imagine enough humans tinkering with DNA to vastly accelerate the rate at which we advance in decoding genetics.
It's already happening in China, India, and the Middle East. We (in the US) may be waiting around to discuss the morale and ethical aspect of it but that doesn't mean it isn't already happening.
P.s. Tries to genetically engineer wings, result gets tiny mosquitoes wings on the nose
good thing the vast majority of terrorists is stupid as fuck
Maybe not the Grim CRIPR but here you go, Heraklines. https://youtu.be/yDzhrO5K02c
Or someone could engineer an airborne Gene Drive weapon, inject themselves (or a willing fanatic) and go expose 1 million people in Time's Square on New Year's Eve. Best case scenario is the crazy person is a Nazi and you wind up with a few million new blond haired blue eyed citizens walking around. Worst case the person is incompetent (or malicious), and everyone exposed dies a slow painful death ala cystic fibrosis or something that makes ebola look tame. CRISPR is amazingly powerful, but it's also astoundingly dangerous. To allow uncontrolled experimentation with DNA modification tools is foolhardy at best.
I'd mostly be worried about some genetic- cowboy mistakenly engineering an airborne super-fungus that will turn us all into walking spore colonies with filaments poking out of the tops of our heads.
I have a variant of mycophobia, and I now despise you for putting this image in my head.
Checked mycophobia on Phobia wiki
Most people get this fear from playing Super Mario Bros.
Wut?
There are mushrooms that hurt you in the game, but I honestly don't see how it would lead to a mycophobia
Which mushrooms? I only know of the beneficial kinds.
Googled it to find out they aren't in the first game, but they are in other mario games
I've had a case of Tinea versicolor for over 10 years. I kept it around for the first few years hoping to become something similar to Bushroot. It didn't go as planned and I had to get rid of it. :(
A good dose of brain fungus will cure what ails ya!
Reference to the video game 'Last of Us'
That would be insanely difficult if not impossible to engineer on accident. Everything you design for removes some survival traits of an organism, synthetic organisms are rarely viable outside a tightly controlled laboratory environment.
Hybrids are a bit different, but again those tend not to be viable either (since they're sterile in almost all cases.)
A mad scientist is far far far more likely to kill themselves than anyone else when working with biotech.
[deleted]
Perhaps I have too much faith in humans, but I suspect absolutely anyone dedicated enough could learn enough to be an amateur scientist.
It's a scary kinda faith, given the variety of humans out there...
If you could make some of these possibly dangerous organisms using CRISPR, you would be leaps and bounds ahead of the top people in the field right now. CRISPR is a great tool for editing the genome, but it would be like trying to swap out a bunch of sentences in a book to change the main characters intentions. BUT you cannot read the language the book is in. You don't know where you would have to make all those edits and you certainly wouldn't know how to change them into anything that meant anything since you can't tell what you are writing.
plenty of people have the time and money to hack at things like this with brute force trial and error...
Anything achievable with brute force, evolution has probably already explored. Since, you know, that's what it is.
Anything achievable with brute force, evolution has probably already explored.
But evolution won't necessarily select for the things humans would select for. A disease that wipes out all potential hosts in a few days is probably not going to survive in the wild, for example. But it's still very useful to murderous asshats.
You guys are turning CRISPR into a Saturday morning cartoon plot device.
Take a look at the current US President's administration and tell me that there aren't literal cartoon bad guys out there.
So where's the literal cartoon protagonists, or would that mean we were in someone else's cartoon so we can't even kill the bad guys or "put them on a bus" if they're the big bads
Yeah, this whole thread is fearmongering.
We've changed the available survivable niches though. Plenty of things that wouldn't work in the wild would be desirable in a lab.
Hahahahaha yeah its just that easy
Or even just lots of time, and people+resources online to bounce the ideas around.
A friend once told me that he believes this is how humanity eventually goes -- a bored teenager, taking ideas from online discussions, tinkering in his/her garage, and unleashing an extinction bug upon humankind.
Hacking away at modifying ebola is likely to get you killed or get the feds involved before you have any success.
Being a mad scientist means not using control groups. Most mad science movies are about a mad engineer.
I used to think anyone could learn to do anything, then I met some people that seemed unteachable so I'm not so sure anymore.
People often don't want their perspective adjusted or corrected. Even temporarily. Often one needs to adjust their perspective to learn a lesson. As someone who is foolishly stubborn, I'm pretty familiar with the desire to cling to the perspective we find most comforting.
With enough time, patience and resources, anyone can learn anything.
That's not to say everything that can be learned is "true", and it's not always good to learn something that isn't, so skepticism and stubbornness can be positives.
If it makes you feel any better the standard ways that scientists "make" DNA is to essentially order it from companies who synthesise it in segments. When you order something they check the sequence and flag it if it is anything untoward.
For example I attempted to have a viral genome synthesised and someone called to ask about it and its legality (it was a virus that infects swine and is not considered pathogenic in humans). In my case it was to confirm that our government hasn't placed it on some sort of list to avoid its accidental release into the country. With smallpox or Ebola I imagine the alarm bells would be ringing like mad.
Note that this doesn't preclude people from synthesisng the oligo nucleotides themselves and resurrecting smallpox, but its a step removed from how most modern scientists work and not something "biohackers" could do easily. When you see stuff about these biohackers, they aren't doing it all from scratch and will buy DNA and cloning enzymes from normal suppliers.
Figuring out how to do it yourself is difficult. Following a set of instructions? Piss easy. I've done some lab work, and I'm convinced I could teach my twelve-year-old cousin how to use CRISPR. She might not understand how it works or what she's doing, but she could do it.
I would be happy if someone would accidentally make a quickly growing, edible weed that contains DMT and an MAOI and then accidentally let it into the wild.
MAOI's have adverse interactions with a lot of common medications, don't they? I know the cold medicine I bought recently said not to take them together.
Kind of. Mostly antidepressants like SSRIs and SNRIs. Also aged cheeses and beer since they contain tyramine which is broken down by MAOs before they reach circulation and cause hypertensive crises.
This is why you should refrain from eating cheese and some other tyramine rich foods in the days before consuming ayahuasca.
Hey another fellow druggie out in the wild, hello friend :)
Hi there my fellow junkie! Eager to inject some marijuanas today?
Can I join you guys? You seem to know what you're about. I'd like 2 marijuanas please.
Okay, okay, just a smokeable DMT weed, then.
DMT doesn't feel good. Like at all. It's not something most people would want to do more than once.
I think you might be confusing DMT with Salvia. They're completely different. DMT is amazing, Salvia is insane and not fun.
[deleted]
i did it twice because i was convinced attempt #1 was just a horrifying fluke.
Terrible hypothesis. never again.
Nope. I've smoked the chemical called DMT and it was an awful body high and intense. No one would just do that every day.
Some people definitely do though, though I'd agree that's overkill
I guess everyone's different, but pretty well everyone I've talked to that has tried it has said it was the most spiritual and amazing experience they've ever had. But yeah, probably not the sort of thing you'd want to do every day.
It's one of those things you love after it's over. DMT was incredible but scary as fuck and not something I'm in a rush to do again.
Did you break through?
Not really. Had an some intense hallucinations but nothing like aliens and life's secrets being revealed.
It felt like a full body orgasm when I did it.
Then I was catapulted through the minds of ancient greek gods and then tumbled across a beach like the one in Contact, slipping between the grains of sand as they laughed with genuine joy at my human attempts to understand creation
I'd probably do it again.
Sucks it didn't feel good for you though, it isn't really meant to be recreational, but that doesn't mean it's a negative experience for everyone.
Nah. Carrots that make cocaine
[deleted]
DMT can 100% be fun. It's like a rollercoaster, yes its intense and almost overwhelming, but it's fun as fuck.
Well it's not what I personally associate with fun. So it seems we have two different notions of fun Haha
Fair enough
I think it’s fun, just in a different way. It can definitely be terrifying, but so can rollercoasters.
I’ve always been a little out there though, so my idea of fun probably differs from most peoples’.
[deleted]
How much DMT did you smoke? Low doses definitely give me that "heavy" feeling, along with the sharp, high-contrast outlines. It also feels like something just went silent. You know when you're in a room with a white noise like a fan in the background but you don't notice it? Then all of a sudden it shuts off and you think, "Damn, it's really quiet in here now". That's what low dose DMT feels like for me. It can be really anxiety-provoking because you're still completely in the real world, but something is just...off...
Medium-high doses (20+ mg) are where the real 'fun' begins. I like to close my eyes and just let it consume me. Crazy-weird fractal patterns and a psychedelic whirring noise usually follow.
I never need a trip sitter for DMT because I'm basically comatose. LSD on the other hand can make me feel like I'm spiraling into madness, which can be interesting, but only if I have a sober person around to ground me.
To each their own I guess. Psychedelics are mysterious compounds, and everyone is affected by them in different ways.
[deleted]
At high doses, you are so overtaken by the visuals and the experience that you really aren't thinking about your body. You can still feel it (at least at high sub-breakthrough doses), but it will be the last thing on your mind.
Honestly, the intensity of it kept me away from it for so long, but once I learned to just let go and be in the moment, it became my favorite psych. If you do decide to try it again, go for at least 25mg and take as many hits as you can. It'll be scary at first, but once you start going through the tunnel, there is nothing but awe and astonishment.
I wouldn't say I've ever had a bad LSD trip (only tripped twice), but the closest to maddness I've ever come was on my second trip when I was playing the Stanley Parable during the peak of 150 µg. Don't ever go down the stairs...
Or yeast. There are alread projects working on doing this for opioids... and I'd imagine a carrot probably has a more complex DNA structure (could check but lazy)
There's good reason for it to be hard to get your hands on. Its not a toy. A person should be mentally prepared for such an experience. Otherwise some horrible behavior would be likely and probably long term trauma. These experiences can be incredibly beneficial if done with care and respect ,but otherwise it's Russian roulette with your brain imo. The people that I know that treat psychedelics lightly usually have come out the worse for the experience, which is sad to me as I have had some tough moments, but also some intensely deep and fundamental experiences that have made me a better person and improved how I look at life as a whole. I even pulled myself out of a deep, year long, depression with the help of mushrooms. I really think scientific study of this stuff is the key to unlocking the minds full potential.
[deleted]
That said, I would think a plant that has quality mdma in a juicy berry would be really good for people. Especially if it only worked on adults and only worked once a year.
Yeah who doesn’t need permanent destruction of some serotonin receptors- feels good man!
Hard to get your hands on? Lol you can get all of the ingredients off of ebay.
That's harder than it being an invasive weed that you can just pick up and eat.
I've always wanted a Marijuana strain with nicotine in it lol kill two birds kind of thing
So basically you want a blunt.
Love blunts good fucking point
Dangerous, it could kill other needed species.
Do you regularly consume DMT and weed with MAOIs? You should stop
They are rima's, quite safe in normal conditions. Just don't take it with any serotonergic drugs.
Why an maoi?
MAOI would make the DMT usable orally, which is how it is usually consumed, as Ayahuasca tea. It would actually work without MAOI if smoked though.
Good info, Thank you!
Also prolong the Experiancd making it less suck you out of the tips of your ears towards another dimension and more visionary and inward looking
You want Cronenbergs? This is how you get Cronenbergs.
Fuck, I am in my mid twenties and by the time I am 40, I am going to have to compete against Genetically modified humans for jobs. I am screwed everyone is screwed.
That's ok, you can take solace in the fact that the genetically modified humans will be competing with robots for jobs.
And genetically modified or no, they will ultimately lose out to their A.I. overlords.
Also, you yourself may be genetically modified as well, but again. A.I. overlords.
As far as I understood, crispr was only able to modify human embryos, animals embryos, bacteria, fungus etc not adult physically matured human beings?
There is also talks about in vivo uses as well, it's just that embryos are easier to work with and the results are more apparent/more immediate.
But currently existing people will mostly like be modded as well, but again, while my post was mostly joking, automation is going to be a serious concern for everyone in the near future.
By the time you are 40 I'd wager that the job market in general will be slim pickings for humans. After all, decent jobs are already hard to come by presently and automation has only just barley got started.
If in vivo were actually possible that would be wholly welcome. It could help millions of adults get cured of genetic diseases.
But automation is likely to happen but people and governments are taking/studying measures across the globe from India to Sweden. The impact will be manegable.
But automation is likely to happen but people and governments are taking/studying measures across the globe from India to Sweden. The impact will be manegable.
Not as much as we should, and here in America we are just trying to sweep it under the rug and pretend it isn't an issue.
I think this will be bigger than we are prepared for.
My country India is running basic income trials in some districts. So far its been promising. Job growth is quite low here
Well, it sounds like your country is much more civilized and progressive thinking than the US is, because at the rate we are going we probably won't even consider a UBI until the economy basically collapses.
I wouldn't underestimate the US political machine. Currently the situation is political logjam but once a few crisis hits then the machine starts working again.
I certainly hope so, because I suspect American society will be in some trouble in the near future if we don't soon start discussing these coming issues.
because at the rate we are going we probably won't even consider a UBI until the economy basically collapses.
Plot twist: that's on purpose, to get people like us to induce a collapse somehow
[deleted]
Keeping up with regular humans is one thing g but what if these new ones have near perfect memory, faster reflexs and even better overall physiology like they get sick at most once a year or just very mild symptoms. How would you compete against that?
What you're talking about is going to take several generations.
If a modified virus can deliver modifications, it could work for living humans.... We're not there yet though... And something like additional limbs would be a no go
You will compete with advanced robotics and neural algorithms, so probably you will be a social shareholder investing his time on neural VR and AI chats.
So I will be a cyborg?
What would be the most effective way to weaponize this? Maybe not the fastest way to destroy a civilization, but it might make for an interesting novel: create a gene-drive of sorts that, after 1 or two generations, sterlizes its victims. No painful bloody deaths and no immediate mass panic.
That was basically the plot of a Stargate SG1 episode:
http://www.tv.com/shows/stargate-sg-1/2010-7400/
We know this is probably possible with our current technology because they do it to kill off mosquitoes in developing nations with high rates of mosquito borne illness.
I highly doubt this would be any cause for concern given the steep learning curve to even know what you're up to. Let's say you're an actual geneticist and know how to use the kit, I'm still doubtful something significant would come out very often.
From previous reddit posts about CRISPR (or outside reading) we know that at best, this can help fix broken parts of DNA. I don't have enough expertise to make a solid analogy, but my personal imagination of this technology is more like genetic spackle. You can patch things up, but creating new things would be reallllly hard. You could maybe patch up some DNA that has dropped a few base pairs, or repair some replication problems, but you're not going to grow wings/tails/whatever.
Anyway, maybe my comment has been made in other replies, but All of the topmost comments seem to be like a wishlist of cool body mods we wish we had. If that's the case, don't hold your breath on someone using this kit to do so.
You start letting hackers fuck with DNA, you're gunna see some shit you didn't expect.
The most likely result is some kid figures how to rearrange his own DNA strands to spell I FUKD UR MUM and then dies of hilarious cancer.
Prepare for unforseen consequences.
Biology is not a field for "hackers" to get into. The average computer hacker is going to give up as soon as he realizes that editing genomes and testing their functionality isn't as simple as typing some characters and pressing the compile button.
How tough would it be to make bacteria that grows cocaine or psilocybin? I mean, if somebody wanted to do that.
It's rather easy to make yeast produce chemicals some other organism produces (like hormones) by moving the gene with the instructions from the desired organism to the yeast, how ever if no such gene for the desired chemical exists in any known organism, you'd have to engineer one by your self which is close to impossible.
Lets say i want to make yeast produce a certain type of dye, and the gene for the creation of that dye already exists, what part of the yeast DNA would i replace with the DNA that produces the dye?
I'd assume it's possible to replace a blank area in the DNA (yes, DNA contains huge chunks that do nothing and are there fore considered blank) and force activate the gene.
Intresting, thanks for the help.
Hi I'm just here for the cocaine.
Of course it's a "cause for concern" but it's sort of like being concerned that the internet is going to enable illegal activities, and therefore refusing to allow its proliferation. What is the result? The non-backward countries monopolize the obvious and dramatic benefits and you shunt yourself even lower in the pecking order. GG.
New technology, especially anything that holds the promise to change the world for the better, is not going to up and disappear just because you find it inconvenient.
"USD is commonly used for money laundering?!?! Back to the barter system, everyone."
It's not like the internet, internet viruses can't kill a human.
Not really DIY unless you are trained in biology. Also, this article is about case 9. We moved to case 13 now...
[deleted]
More accurate
We are still a long way away from adult genome editing. CRISPR only really works at the one cell stage of an embryo, where the lesions or insertions can be propagated to all daughter cells. Everyone who is talking about weaponizing this doesn't realize how difficult it is to get a loaded (with a guide RNA) CAS9 protein into a large portion of cells in a tissue.
Would it not be easy to swap out a pathogenic e. coli bacterial culture with the one included in the kit? This would allow some one to make a pathogenic antibiotic resistant e. coli with out having to do any leg work except sourcing the pathogenic culture.
What would you do to the pathogenic e. coli? The kit just tells you how to make it survive on a specific chemical. The usefulness of CRISPR is super limited since we have no idea what the vast majority of genes do. Not to mention how to edit them to make them function in a different way. I am pretty sure in this kit they give you pre-edited e. coli and you are just simply undoing the edit they made before they sent it to you.
The kit allows the included e. coli to survive in the presence of the included antibiotic.
[deleted]
Fair enough, but still I would argue that the potential to use kits like this for nefarious purposes is feasible.
Feasible yes. But very unlikely CRISPR would be the easiest route someone would take to do such a thing. We may know a descent amount about how to manipulate DNA, but we have no knowledge of the vast majority of gene function. Even less about how to manipulate genes to change their function to a desired outcome.
time to start selling Human Antivirus subscriptions; Get your update shot daily!
I wonder how long it will be until someone offers a DNA backup service. It's a pretty common sci-fi trope (we can reverse this if we have some of their DNA from before it happened), but doesn't seem totally out of the realm of possibility. Making use of the backup would be the hard part.
Can some one make me a retrovirus that causes me to produce a low amount of Thc and works through a repressible operon.
And then fail every drug test ever
Would still do.
I wonder if this could be used to make vegetables taste like pepperoni pizza?
[deleted]
Pizza has veggies on it, dude, it isn't only cheese or pepperoni or whatever
So... are we anywhere close to modifying already full-grown humans with this yet? Huge anime tiddies for everyone or bust.
Nope. Since each cell has it's own copy of DNA the big challenge for changing fully grown adults is modifying a lot of cells all at once. While some diseases can be cured by modifying only a few cells (diseases where an enzyme is missing or malfunctioning), the limiting factor for gene therapy has always been the delivery mechanism, not our ability to modify DNA. This is certainly a step closer to doing more nuanced work: modifying a specific place in the genome rather than inserting new DNA in random places (which often leads to cancer). However, delivery is still an issue. As for your "anime tiddies" there's always hormone therapy ;)
Can diseases modify human DNA? Because if that's possible then you could modify the disease so it changes what you want. I'm not near to being an amateur so I'm probably talking shit. Forgive me if I'm being stupid
Nowhere even near, sorry.
Isn't that the same thing, though?
Traps. Traps everywhere.
The apartment of Dr Moreau. No, maybe the garage of human centipedes. Anyway, the point is we're going from a place where if you're ex was really pissed at you, they'd out your nude snapshots online. Soon, if they're pissed they'll be able to turn your immune system off, or make you grow a tail.
I'd fucking love to have a tail
I already have a front one.
Good for you!
I have a tail.
^^^It ^^^makes ^^^pants ^^^hard ^^^to ^^^wear
Everyone would know when you're angry.
Immunity against influenza would be great. Immunity against HPV, varicella or AIDS would be fun too.
If someone can get immune with DNA tweaking, then why not ?
I mean, do you get your flu shots? Protection from a lot of these is already within reach.
Don't they already have a vaccine against HPV which is 95%+ effective?
yep, 3 doses for 600 USD.
OR 800 USD for 98% protection.
Alright, this is a topic that I love and it's awesome to see so much written about it, but if I see one more article that talks about how CRISPR/cas9 or CRISPR/Cpf1 is a tool for "Hacking DNA" I think I'll explode. It's not any easier to understand than simply saying "editing DNA" or "modifying DNA." It serves no other purpose than for shit writers to try to get clicks. There is zero justification for this type of absurd language. If anything it obscures what CRISPR actually does.
The mass majority of Reddit seems to not understand how CRISPR works
There was a Batman Beyond episode about this. Didn't go well.
I came here for this.
I don't think this is that scary. Just producing something in microorganisms efficiently is pretty hard. Source: biotech engineering master student
Awesome ... good-bye diabetes!
EDIT: oops, I have cancer now.
Wouldnt this be good? I can edit out genetic diseases out of my kids and make them super smart or tall
yeah, I doubt you or anyone else (unless you have experience and/or training in biology) can pull that off out of their own garage. I'd wager that a good most of us would end up messing with something we don't fully understand with fatal results.
I'd wager that a good most of would end up messing with something we don't fully understand with fatal results.
It's called 'evolution'. Some die, but the survivors end up as super-humans.
Some dude tinkering with his own genetics and accidentally liquefying his genitals in his home is not evolution. That's called stupidity.
The point I'm trying to make here is, if you don't know what you are doing, you would do well to stay away from this.
"I'm gonna make me an' muh kidz immortal! hur hur!"
yeah, no you're not.
[deleted]
Calm down. I meant if they have kits you can edit then it's likely there are specialists who can edit yours more cheaply because of how wide spread it would be. For a while the only place I heard who would do something like this was China for a hefty price. Save your hack the internet memes for blog post journalists
[removed]
[deleted]
Sure buddy.
I actually just learned about CRISPR a week ago listening to RadioLab podcasts. The ethics of using CRISPR on animals and humans is very interesting to say the least, the ramifications of a CRISPR DNA strand affecting other things is the biggest issue that was brought up in the RadioLab episode. Curious to see where this technology goes, but scared where it could go awry.
Somewhere Dan Simmons is getting a good chuckle out of this...
Can this only be used on humans? What about plants and mushrooms? I doubt most people have the knowledge and expertise to manage such a powerful tool anyway.
This technology can be used on any DNA as long as the sequence is known, which is increasingly easy to do nowadays. You can sequence any organism and create specific guides to edit distinct sequences of a genome. The lesions that CAS9 creates are inconsistent and happen on a cell by cell basis, so for best results you need to edit at the one cell stage of a developing embryo to have one mutation or insertion propagated throughout the whole organism. And getting the whole system to work is really quite easy, there are plenty of programs that design efficient guides based off known genome sequences, some companies will synthesize the RNA for you, and Cas9 protein is commercially available as well. That's really all you need.
I'm all for genetic engineering and open source science... but this is playing with fire. Academic and industry labs are regulated and monitored spaces, and follow proper biowaste disposal protocols per institutional, local, state, and federal laws/guidelines. There is a system of accountability in place for these institutions to prevent safety mishaps and environmental damage. Also, these facilities have equipment and people who focus entirely on safe waste disposal. The issue I have with letting anyone use gene editing tools like CRISPR, is A) they could hurt themselves or others if they don't know what they're doing and, maybe more importantly B) they could contaminate ecosystems with GMOs or mutagenic materials. It's going to be really hard/impossible to regulate and inspect garage labs, and this could open the door to some serious problems if, say, someone decides to make a bacteria/animal/plant with some funky advantage over wild types, and it somehow gets out of the "lab" and into nearby wildlife.
(PhD student in a synthetic biology lab)
The people willing to buy CRISPR kits this early are clearly capable of understanding the implications. I'm worried about the CRISPR 10-20 years from now when they figure out how to explain it properly to the masses, when you can buy it over the counter at a rite-aid, that's when people should be concerned.
Well that sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.
We are getting ever closer to the Trabsmetropolitan world
Wow, just a few years from our first real super villain.
Do we really want to start messing about with what we essentially are? We’re a product made by Earth over countless millennia. Why would anyone, anyone at all, think for even a second that they could do a better job of it with no longer term consequences? Sheer reckless stupidity, eugenics disguised as research. One man’s opinion.
Why would anyone, anyone at all, think for even a second that they could do a better job of it
Let's say you have a pile of stone and wood.
A) Stick them in a box. Shake the box around and let nature do its thing.
B) Build a house.
Which do you think will give better results?
Not a good analogy. Here’s a better one:
A) Place DNA into a biological environment and wcosystem and wait 10,000 years and see what kind of life has evolved to suit that environment.
B) Place some DNA in a lab and let scientists loose on it for 39 years and see what kind of life they’ve invented which “might” survive for a few hours.
We’ve tried this before, wasn’t good then, why is it gonna be good now? And DEFINITELY not good long term.
And we evolved the ability to manipulate our DNA.
This is all natural. All just one step after the other. This is just an example of an organism developing a new method of evolving. At one point DNA was the new kid on the block, having evolved from RNA. At one point things didn't breed, then they evolved the ability to breed and changed how evolution worked.
This is just one more natural step along the road.
It's interesting these concerns have been around in fact for 30+ years and in fiction, of course, longer. The entry point for genetic labs has been relatively low cost since the 80's. It's only going to get easier from here.
Every time I see the phrase “hack DNA” with CRISPR I die a little inside. That’s not how this works, that’s not how any of this works.
Oh boy, prepare yourself to see some weird shit in the next decades when inevitably dumbasses try to breed spider men, wolverines, and all that stuff.
It's about time this stuff got cheap enough for garage scientists.
Someone for the love of all that is good and holy cure type 1 diabetes with this shit. I've been waiting almost 14 years. Let's get going, bud.
I think a lot of people are missing the point with this. The more people use it the more we learn.
Was thinking of putting a few strands of my DNA into a guppy. Releases a bunch of them into the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn.
Survivors will last forever. I'll be immortal I guess.
anyone able to post the exact process of crispr? Like what you would expect to see on a university level biology? I don't want to have to but a $300 biology book just for 1 chapter
I think the wide availability of something like this is a good thing, and I'd think that even if there was no chance of any important scientific discoveries being made from it. Besides the fact that people who want to experiment with it ought to be able to, my reasoning is that this isn't something "owned" by someone who can decide who should and shouldn't have it. No one has any more or less of a right to it than anyone else. As such, there's nothing immoral about making it widely available, as it's not "wrong" for anyone to have access to it. Therefore, we shouldn't depend on it not being widely available. Having it already widely available will make sure we aren't depending on something unreliable like that, and it'll also make sure that all the people interested in messing with it won't be in a situation where they can't only because no one wants to make it possible.
I feel that we could build a pegasus if we really wanted to.
Sorry kids, no hacker in his garage is going to do anything meaningful with DIY molecular biology.
This costs a load of money, needs specific knowledge and not a hope of it being here.
Probably a good thing for society, I have specific thing I want to weaponise and some animals to increase profitability.
The whole living thing takes time to grow and breed really puts a cramp on this CRISPR world also nerfs the ideas in my lifespan IRL as well.
so im gonna start a gofundme to make dinosaurs again
So, we're basically generating antibiotic resistant bacteria in our own homes. This just seems like a bad idea. And I love crispr. I do it on the daily. But man that's a bad idea
Manipulation is not the same as evolution, call it what you will.
'Amatuer scientists' or in real world terms... Grad students doing pet research projects on their own time. OH NOES!
It's going to take very specialized knowledge to actually use that. Random shmucks won't manage a damn thing with it, so I'm about as concerned for that as I am about chemical supply stores selling chemical ingredients to whomever.
[deleted]
Sorry, they told us not to tell people who graduated before us how to implant genes 😐
I've been hacking away for some time and I think I've nearly got perfection:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C4Sm7DhWAAEpAqh.jpg
wow there are kits for this already? that was fast, although I bet it would be expensive.
Wow, I heard this CRISPR being mentioned in a Youtube vid where a scientist explained it in 5 different ways, ranging from a 5 year old explanation to a phd or the highest level explanation.
Ok so I'm probably oversimplifying a lot here but will this be a way to have CRISPR go into someone's DNA and tweak it so myopia or alopecia or other malformalities are turned off and possibly reversed? Or will this even be possible?
We should mail one of these to Mark Mothersbaurg's house.
wow. instead of innocently making bacteria glow in the dark, we are literally engineering bacteria to be resistant to antibiotics.
and bacteria can pass these resistance genes to different kinds of bacteria...
if I end up getting an incurable flesh eating disease because of this crispr kit, I'm gonna find the seller and make it look like an accident.
Most bacteria that scientists work with have an antibiotic resistance gene. It's used to select for the bacteria of interest when you grow a culture or make a Petri dish. This is standard microbiology procedure.
That's not nearly as dangerous as you make it out to be. Most lab bacteria are resistant to one of the already outdated antibiotics as a way to kill of the ones that aren't modified.
We did this in my university courses, it's that easy and safe.
Ugh, if I hear the term "hacking" applied to biology one more time...
Genetic engineering and biology will never be a "crowd-sourced" thing. It's not as simple as computer programming where you need a computer and a text editor and you have the potential to build the next popular app in your basement. Biology has far too many variables, and it takes far more patience than programming. You also need far more resources. You might be able to use one of Zayner's charlatan kits to use CRISPR to make bacteria turn a different color or something, but that's science-fair level science. Making a tangible contribution to genetics takes an entire laboratory. That's not something that's going to change any time soon. Some fool in his kitchen messing around with E Coli is not science, and it's not revolutionary. People who have no background in biology don't need to think themselves to be "biohackers", and you need to understand the limitations of genetics. After looking at most of these comments I feel saddened by people's lack of basic biological knowledge.
[deleted]
Even if we could easily magically “print” organisms today with genetic modifications it would take a lot of biological knowledge and background to even know which genes to change and how and even why. Even the top genetics experts hardly know how our genes function and interact. We are complete toddlers when it comes to understanding our own code. There are a lot more unknowns in biology than in your computer science/3D printing example where the components are entirely derived from man. There’s no software you can learn to be able to fully understand how organisms work.
There’s no software you can learn to be able to fully understand how organisms work.
No, but there will be.
And the more people working on genetic modification, the sooner it will happen.
I don't know HTML. However, I do know python, R, and FORTRAN. I also study biology and I've worked on a research project in genetic engineering. The only reason to call gene editing "hacking" is to get clicks on someone's tech blog when they run another story about how biohackers are "hacking" their own DNA. I agree that people used to say computers are too difficult and complex for the average consumer. Computers, however, are man-made, and were able to be scaled down and simplified for the average consumer. Even E. coli, a relatively simple bacterium, is orders of magnitude more complex than any computer on the market today. There's no way to make life itself any more simple, and I can't possibly imagine any contribution to genetics that could be made by someone who picks up a pipette one day and tries their hand at editing genes. Unlike hacking on a computer, gene editing is a science that has rigor to it, and it's not something a lay person will ever be able to pick up. Period.
At this point they're still working with what amounts to assembler. Maybe in 50 years somebody will come up with a complete language that compiles to genetic code.
if I hear the term "hacking" applied to biology one more time...
Preach on. Bugs me every single time as well.
Your lack of knowledge about programming would give anyone's lack of knowledge about biology a run for it's money. If you think equipment or expertise is a major impediment to the kind of people who would seek to do this sort of thing then you're a fool. Nuclear science is difficult but a 14 yearold still managed to build a functioning nuclear reactor in his garage from uranium he mined himself, as in with a pickaxe in a mine.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/150726-nuclear-reactor-fusion-science-kid-ngbooktalk/
Would it be possible to edit like a carrot to produce caffeine using crispr? End result is caffeinated carrots.
I have seen how people create their own characters' appearance for online games. We have much to fear.
So this is how The Walking Dead starts?
Words words extra words this stupid automoderator won't let me have any fun and now I still have to keep typing, why can't we post shorter comments?
Everything is fine untill some one makes an airborne super aids that kills billions. That's really hard to do right? Right???
This is absolutely a cause for concern. This is how the zombocalypse happens, or at least the next viral pandemic of any common human virus as we freely mutate our own genetic information without full understanding of how our DNA works. Even non-coding regions serve a structural purpose to control how coding regions are expressed.
I hear Dr Ian Malcom's voice in my head... Frantic...
How about a giant tardigrade which borrows DNA from spores, allowing it to fold space?
I don’t know much about editing dna but I do know what people are capable of given a create-a-character option. If this advances to sci-fi levels then the children of the future will be monsters.
So theoretically with this kit i could hack DNA and make a dragon?
You would have to fill in the missing DNA from a frog.
Probably missing DNA from several animals if i had to guess.
Unless this is a movie reference that went over my head.
Jurassic Park; the missing dino DNA was filled in with frog DNA
I should have known this.
nope, mosquito
Just think how much further ahead our technology could be right now, if not for 'experts' wanting to restrict it because 'cause for concern'.
Just like how everyone is happy we invented DDT and Agent Orange?
Don't know why "experts" is in quotes, but people using science-fair level kits to genetically modify E Coli isn't going to advance anything. Laboratories of dedicated people are required to uncover anything novel about genetics and genetic engineering. It's not as simple as people playing with raspberry pi's.
Laboratories of dedicated people are required to uncover anything novel about genetics and genetic engineering.
And the world will only ever need a dozen computers.
ohh goody. Amateurs playing with DNA. A whole new age of virus. What could possibly go wrong?
Reminds me of John Ringo's novel "Underneath a graveyard sky" enjoy all.
[deleted]
A lot of those concerns are just highly subjective philosophy though. Not all, but most.
Yeah, that's not an origin story for a super villain waiting to happen.
This is exactly why we can't debate this seriously.
Excellent. This comes just in time for my work on a cold hearty (kudzu x poison ivy). I was having some troubles before but with this and a few youtube videos I should be able to do the first back-cross this spring.
Oh this is good and terrifying. Everyone get in your bomb shelters cause we are fucked now. This is gonna become a mail order virus with a 100% fatality rate.
Why not give the article a read rather than just the title?
Reddit is for sensationalism isn't it?
🦆+🐷=☠️
Any virologist able to answer whether this would enable editing of regular flu.
Cos we know that's not going to do any harm right?
Why leave it to chance interaction of ducks and pigs.
Flu has RNA in its genome, not DNA - so it's not as “straightforward“ as editing cells (which itself takes months of work from a PhD student + equipment worth a million+ USD). You'd have to edit a DNA copy of the flu RNA and then write it back into RNA, hoping a life virus comes out. This process as well can take months to years because it can be very to reanimate a (negative strand) RNA virus from DNA.
That being said some single nucleotide mutations have been identified for flu which increase pathogenicity. After all the whole thing of “dual use“ (as weapon and for science) reemerged into news two years ago as a research group based in the US wanted to find out how a flu virus made itself air-transmissible (which they achieved just by letting it sit in an animal, waiting for a physically separated animal get infected).
Yes it is a massive one, I was at a conference it was discussed that if terrorists ever figured it out were fucked
Maybe fucked-ish if they make viruses but if they use it to essentially make themselves super-villains, all we need to do is make super-heroes and hope that doesn't mean we're in a simulation
This reminds me of the middle ages when the Catholic Church believed the Bible could only be read and interpreted by Priests. The lay were not equipped to understand and interpreted the Word of God.
Knowledge is power.
So, what's the best way to create a backup? I'm never convinced by anti-virus as a first line of defence and I needed more words so I stole this from another comment.
Well this isn't what Andrew Ryan had in mind, but I'm sure this is how it starts.
Can this be used to replace a section of DNA responsible for a trait associated with an ethnicity, and replace it with something lethal?
Not trying to be edgy, but I'm genuinely curious if this is scientifically possible.
Lol experts overstate the abilities of amateur scientist.
Shit the eugenics wars are coming closer to reality
But that still means we're canon-divergent because they happened in the 90s in canon
Welcome to 2006. Kits for all kinds of DNA hacking have been around for years
I'm scared of CRISPR. I mean, on one hand you have bacteria that have been around since the dawn of time, taking millions of years to evolve by the slimmest of margins of errors to change into something fatal or beneficial to mankind. On the other hand you have Kieth, who masturbates on the tanning bed and thinks Socrates was just some guy in Bill and Teds Excellent Adventure.
T-Virus. The T-Virus is what they could accomplish.
And an online marketplace will sell you "mods", and many people will download a "virus"
How is mail order CRISPR even legal? Couldn't you easily kill yourself doing it through accidental frameshifts or disruption of cell cycle genes?
Oh boy, here I go curing malaria! And, also starting a zombie virus.
ALRIGHT BOYS LETS OPEN OUR MAIL AND GET THAT ARMY OF APE-MEN READY FOR TOMORROW
My biggest concern is whether or not Russian hacker farms will be able to literally hack into American embryos and hard code people to vote for the corpse of El Donaldo
I'm glad thats you're biggest concern. Because its both ridiculous and impossible.
I now turn you into pigs. I have solve the overpopulation of hooman and the starvation epidemic in onez blow.
[deleted]
Oh reddit dont change. So full of sad acts.
Note the mid european mad scientist terminology? I am endeavouring to make a sense of humour for those born without but most of reddit are hopeless cases unfortunately.
I just want to know could this be used to determine to see if you dna is completely different from your parents cheaper then the 23 and me thing?
Really I'm starting to think I'm a vampire as I can't stand being in the sun and I like heat but I get rashes from any source of heat, so yeah. And yes, i do like the taste of blood.
But the real question is will we be able to finally create anime neko girls for human companionship?
And when after that will they rise up and demand full human rights? ;)
Crowd sourced genetics, eh?Sound like a sure way to get EVERYTHING ON A COB. Seriously though, it could make a great teaching tool.
I want to inject my banded killifish, and try to make him colorful and breed others with the same traits
I'm a geneticist working with CRISPR on a daily basis. Feel free to ask me anything.
Edit: Hey everyone, thanks for all the interest in this. Currently busy in lab but will try to get to everyone throughout the day.
Edit 2: So many replies O_o. I have to stop for the night but I'll see if I can get back to at least a few more of you tomorrow and possibly do an actual AmA (as was suggested). I underestimated the interest there would be in this and want to give you all well thought out answers to your questions.
Edit 3: Haven't had much time today but wanted to pop in and answer a few of the common questions I'm seeing a lot as well as clear up some misnomers.
Question 1: "Is genetically engineering something new we can do because of CRISPR?" The biggest misconception people seem to have about CRISPR is that genetic engineering is something new. We've actually been able to do most of the things (OK many, I cannot make you a dragon even with CRISPR) people suggest for a long time now. Cloning: moving genes from one organism to another, has been around since the 70's or earlier and is the reason for many of our strides in biology to date. We've been able to do pretty much anything we want in most microorganisms and many plants without CRISPR. There have been a lot of questions like "Can I use CRISPR to make yeast or ecoli that make substance x." The answer to this is sure, but you wouldn't. Easy and effective methods for doing just about anything you want to yeast and bacteria have been around for decades. These are known as "genetically tractable" organisms, i.e. organisms that are supper easy for us to genetically engineer. I can send you a kit that has the same result as the one in the article without using any CRISPR/Cas9 technology.
Question 2: "So what has CRISPR brought to the table? Is the hype about it overblown?" Yes and no. CRISPR is an incredible technology and I am extremely grateful to be in science at a time when it is available as a tool. That said, a lot of the media's perception of what CRISPR does is way off base. One of the major things CRISPR does is lets us make specific changes in previously difficult to engineer organisms such as mammalian cells. We've been able to do this for a long time now without CRISPR as well, but CRISPR makes it easy and efficient. That means we can do things on a larger scale than ever before in these organisms. We can rapidly knock out every known gene in the human genome one at a time and see what they all do under specific circumstances (which is part of what my work entails). Another great thing CRISPR does for us is lets us bring proteins to specific places in the genome. There is A LOT of cool stuff we can do with this but since the focus of questions has been on genetic engineering I'll focus on that. Think of CRISPR like a sniper rifle, where as previous methods were more like a shotgun. Using lentivirus (modified HIV) we've been able to put genes in mammalian cells easily, but we didn't have much control over WHERE they went. I could make a virus that makes glowing mouse cells in a dish, but each of those cells would have the DNA for GFP (the gene that makes them glow) in a different place. Some of those places might be really bad and interrupt another gene that was doing something important (like preventing you from getting cancer). CRISPR lets you cut the genome in a specific place and insert the GFP DNA somewhere more intentional. Take this same example and replace GFP with a life saving gene therapy protein and you can see why this is such a big deal.
Question 3: Can CRISPR give me wings, super-powers, a larger/second penis (yes this has been asked a lot) or cure my disease?" Sorry to be a downer but it most of the more extreme cases (wings etc..) the answer is no. Can it give your kids these things though? Probably at some point in the future. What you're essentially asking about is gene therapy, and yes CRISPR is going to make a big splash here. With CRISPR, it's super easy to modify a single cell, or a bunch of cells and just pick out what you want. It's another thing to modify a fully grown organism. There are two major hurdles to gene therapy in adults: 1) Delivery: getting the DNA into enough of the affected cells in a persons body to make a difference, and 2) Precision making sure we only make the changes we intend. CRISPR solves the precision problem to a large degree, but delivery is still a major problem as your body's immune system is a highly tuned machine designed to prevent foreign DNA such as viruses from getting into your cells. There is hope though for a lot of people suffering from genetic disorders, as many of these issues revolve around missing genes and only need a small amount of the missing protein to be expressed to make a big difference. So yes, this is a big deal for medicine and gene therapy and you should be super excited, but no it cannot give you wings, as that would involve modifying all of the cells in your body to an extent that we really can't do yet and most of those changes would have had to happen before birth.
Can I edit carrot genes to make them produce caffeine? End result would be caffeinated carrots.
this is a very specific idea. hate coffee but love carrots?
Caffeine pills would be much easier.
but how else am i going to up my vitamin A?!
vitamin A... pills?
https://i.imgur.com/ZlgW7nb.gif
Use crispr to make vitamin A pills that taste like carrots but that also contain coffee.
Edit coffee bean genes to make them produce Vitamin A
What if you feed the carrots caffeinated water.
So... coffee?
Maybe Caffeine pills dissolved in water!
Or water dissolved in caffeine pills!
Are you able to make these suppositories? Asking for a friend...
The carrot is a nice ergonomic shape for this.
Just boof it
Just bidoof it.
I like some carrofe with my tommaco.
what, too good for covfefe?
"I CAN SEE SO WELL AT NIGHT GUYSSSSSS!!!!!" - fighter pilots in WWIV
Interesting idea. This is probably very doable. You'd have to look at what genes are involved in caffeine synthesis and how much of that is already present in carrots.
I don't think carrots have the pathway to synthesize caffeine, even though they produce large amounts of the precursors.
What about meth? What about cocaine? What about herpes?
Porque no los...tres?
I can only handle two of them at a time...
Fine, carrots and herpes for you then
Tomatoes do though
Yeah but Tomatoes are solonaceous so they're pretty different metabolically.
How do I get started? How do I figure if the genes are already in the carrots?
Step 1: Get a biomed degree
????
$$$$ Profit $$$$
What about dandelion+carrot+caffeine?
Then it produces a caffeinated carrot that makes puffballs of seeds that spread in the wind dispersing more caffeinated carrots?
Imagine the impact on sports medicine.
No more injecting steroids - just add a bit of gorilla DNA.
It's not that simple. To get the desired effect, you'd need to treat every single cell in the body. Alternatively, you could treat stem cells, inject them into a blastocyst, carry that to term. The result would be a child which is a mix of both modified and non-modified cells. If one of the modified cells grew to form the eggs or sperm of this child, it will be able to pass on the modification to its own offspring (which then will then carry the modification in every cell of their body) - You probably need more than one attempt to get this right.
So to get that gorilla-gene-super-athlete you need the ability to inject blastocysts, implant the resulting embryo, need a woman to carry it to term. Most of all, you need another generation after that.
And that is only to get a person to carry the modification on one allele. To get a homozygous strain you'd probably need some inbreeding and a whole bunch of generations. With human litter sizes being so small, this experiment would be a huge pain to set up.
Other than ethical dilemmas and the fact that this would take generations, we can do this right now though? Right? Or can we not inject blastocysts yet?
I'm going to go google blastocysts now.
Yes, we could do this right now. Actually we are doing it with tons of lab animals. Enigineering transgenic mouse lines in this way is regular part of PhD theses nowadays, everybody and their mom does it. In a few years I expect ambitious Master students will run projects like these.
But if you paid attention, there's a few coin-flips in that process. With mice that isn't a problem, because with litters of 15 mice you WILL have one that carries the desired alteration. Do this on a human, and you might have to try several times.
Another problem is the inbreeding that is required to get a homozygous individual. Humans don't react that well to inbreeding.
So mice don't react badly to inbreeding ? Or perhaps there are problems, but the problems don't interfere with the experimental work, and ethical issues aren't so constraining when it's mice ?
The mice have a prefect genetic background so inbreeding can't bring out those weird recessive alleles that make inbreeding notoriously messy in humans. Edit: lab mice have a perfect genetic background
As an engineer working in software it sounds like we need to do some code clean-up on the human genome. It seems like there's quite a bit of technical debt from the previous development team's iterative design approach.
More seriously, have there been any CRISPR gene therapies developed for eliminating genetic disorders?
Layman answer, pretty sure that was the original goal for CRISPR, but don't quote me on that.
You're not saying this just because you want to inbreed are you?
Mice are perfect!
Could we then using CRISPR get rid of inbreeding complications? Making your own pureblood targaryn family tree
Humans do just fine if you pick the right people.
Pitcairn Islands were settled by 6 men and 11 women; and the majority of inhabitants are their descendants.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,883297,00.html
And it seems quite possible North America was settled by 70-200 people or so:
http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050523/full/news050523-3.html
Huh, interesting. Thanks for the links!
Can it be made to alter genes that affect intelligence and behaviour? So could in theory more intelligent, co-operative mice be created after a couple generations?
Can't they treat every cell in the body using some kind of virus though? That's what I thought I'd read.
I don't think anyone would go near creating a virus that could alter the DNA of every cell in a person's body. If the code for creating such a virus got out, then you could potentially cause some horrific things. I'm not saying I'm scared of the future, I'm just trying to imagine what people could do. I also think that there will be some convention against using such techniques in warfare, if they aren't already covered.
Oh yeah I'm sure it would be bad I just thought I heard that they had been experimenting with that.
Time to seek volunteers.
Removed by Power Delete Suite - RIP Apollo
Is there no way to genetically edit a human or other creature without having to reproduce them? I mean, can we edit out diseases and conditions? I get that major changes to the body are currently impossible to do, but what about immune reactions and the like?
couldnt you engineer a virus to carry the treatment to every cell or enough cells at least?
There have been rumblings and rumors of the Chinese attempting such projects for athletics programs a few years now.
Couldn't we get a virus to change cells and gametes?
So you're saying I should use CRISPR to edit my kids and make them super humans?
TO make your grandchildren superhumans, yes. Or to make them horribly disfigured mutatns, depending on how competent you are.
I'd like to think im a pretty competent person
A lot of people have that anyway, so I'm sure it would happen.
That would be playing God.
Well if it's a sin to play God he should have not left all tools laying around to do so.
The acceptable answer to "That would be playing God" is "God, schmod. I want my monkey man!" --- Bart Simpson
No, we're not playing.
You could certainly do this by genetic engineering. But CRISPR just edits what is already present, whereas caffeine synthesis would require new genes.
Not quite. You can simply inject foreign DNA along with CRISPR/Cas9, and it will integrate into the host genome wherever you want it to. Before we could have DNA integrated into a random locus, CRISPR allows for specificity - which is the beauty of it.
Depending on the way you set it up, CRISPR can have many applications. Genetic engineering is one of those applications, and CRISPR is used to great effect in that field.
So I get some dna of some plant that makes caffeine, mix it up with crispr/cas9 and soak carrot seeds in this?
Then grow the carrot seeds?
You design and clone/synthesise a fragment of DNA which contains the promoters, genes, and terminators required to express enzymes required for caffeine biosynthesis. You then introduce that DNA into carrot either by traditional GM engineering techniques (random insertion either by biolistics or Agrobacterium-mediated transformation) or targeted insertion to a specific genomic site by CRISPR, Zn finger, TALEN or other.
I have no business in this thread.
It's really not that complicated once you have the foundation knowledge. Kinda like glorified Lego.
'Biolistics' is a fancy way of saying 'shoot the DNA in'. They actually used to use shotgun cartridges with tiny gold pellets coated with DNA instead of lead shot.
And Agrobacterium is just nature's own genetic engineer - a bacterium that injects DNA into a plant so it starts producing sugars and amino acids that the bacteria like. We just replace some of that DNA with what we are interested in. Very cool stuff.
I read this entire comment like it was an episode of School House Rock thank you for making it make sense OP.
u/Jimbop047 Loved your answer!! I'm passionate about getting the foundational knowledge and trying this out... but the idea of a college degree seems absurdly expensive and offensively inefficient. If you had a million dollars on the line and 4 months to train someone to do create GM carrots how would you go about it? Any books, videos, forums...mentorships?
Well, you would need to perform a medium-sized study of biosynthetical pathways of caffeine along with the genetics and epigenetics that make them possible. And I'm not sure if simply soaking the seeds would be enough, those things are tough to the outside environment.
But, in theory, yes! It could really be that simple.
But wouldn't it be way easier to have a bacteria make the caffeine?
Ab-so-lutely, but who doesn't want energy carrots, right?
Yes, CRISPR has many applications ranging from specific mutations/deletions through to targeted insertion of transgenic or cisgenic DNA. However, CRISPR has become such a hot topic in large part because the uses which do not involve insertion of new DNA are likely to escape regulatory restrictions which are currently placed on GM engineering.
So while it is certainly correct to say that CRISPR is not limited in scope to simple deletion/mutation outcomes, this is what most people are talking about when they compare CRISPR with traditional GM.
CRISPR alone would not be of any use in engineering a caffeinated carrot unless native carrot genes required only tweaks to nudge their activity toward production of caffeine (or stop breakdown of caffeine etc). If new DNA is required then CRISPR will be an enabling tool to allow the targeted insertion of traditional GM DNA.
If they can make any plant grow like cauliflower, they can insert new genes.
You can add new genes with CRISPR. It's called an exogeneous DNA insertion. You just need to add additional proteins to the editing complex.
So a possible solution would be to splice the gene into it and use crisper to enable it? Sorry if my understanding is wrong please enlighten me if it's wrong
I knew a guy in college who was able to cross breed thc bearing carrots as his senior thesis
You know why I am asking this question. Any link to the published research?
Sadly he never gave me the research. I asked when he graduated then I saw him randomly years later and he still never gave it to me. Probably had short term memory issues...
Your best bet would be to look into Wentworth Institute of Technology 1996-1997. That’s when I knew him. If you find it please share it with all (but specifically with me!)
Is this something you have put some thought into?
doesn't require CRISPR
Easiest way to make this happen?
agrobacterium? a bunch of genes? a biosensor for caffeine which confers fitness to carrots with elevated caffeine levels? many options
Will drinking it at night give me night vision?
Asking the important questions
Much rather have THC broccoli. Healthy highs.
http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/Tomacco
Does this type of sensationalist, anti-scientific fear mongering bother you as much as it does me? You still need a reasonably high level of education and resources to modify organisms, so creating a terrifying, rainbow-coloured tardigrade (or whatever that cute, harmless bug is) is certainly not the immediate and logical consequence of de-centralized scientific tools/materials, as the photo suggests.
I totally agree! That's why I offered to answer some questions :)
You are a science-hero, friend. Thank you for reaching out to a public which seems to be naturally dubious of 'mad-scientists'. Education for all is the integral to progress.
So we can make really cool/creepy multi-colored tardigrade thingies? 'Cause I'm totally registering for that class!
could an insane person bent on destruction use this as a weapon against a large group of people? that is my concern here...
The answer would be no in this case. That insane person would have better luck with a machine gun or dirty bombs.
so much cringeworthy stuff out there, one guy who wants to make his muscles huge is injecting himself with CRISPR mammalian cell transformation mix. Unsurprisingly it hasn't worked. If it were to work you would essentially need a fully functional laboratory. You'd need to be able to CRISPR some cell in a soup, identify the one that has repaired the DSB in the way you've intended, propagate that cell, THEN inject it.
It's just all really embarrassing to watch this unfolding
Yeah but if someone gets a lucky draw...
That's called evolution.
Really, all you'd be likely doing if you're trying random shit is making new and exciting types of cancer.
Nature has been doing this for years ... yeah, sometimes something bad happens, but I think the national defense labs of the world are already populated with more terror-strains of bio-warfare than anything we can make in the basement.
My comment was too short so it was removed. It said That virus, that's what comes into my mind xD
Not op, but, regardless of the fear mongering it's definitely both amazing and terrifying. Granted, rainbow tardigrades are probably not happening; however, with undergrad molecular biology knowledge you could: add extra PrP and cause prions (Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, etc), cause NHEJ at pretty much every near consensus promoter for total chaos at the transcriptomic level, delete any essential gene, or whatever. The possibilities for a Dan Brown's Inferno like future are definitely there. At the same time, the tech to do this has essentially been around since we have had an understanding of viral vectors so I don't think we have to be incredibly stressed about it, but it's definitely something to be aware of. The FBI actually came to my department and met with several faculty members to ask exactly the question in the title: is the availability of CRISPR a cause for concern. The answer was a resounding, "Maybe."
Science aside, as an arts person, I love this phrase
Also, thank you for the veiwpoint
Hey man, speak for yourself. If I had the education my neighbors would be sprouting bat wings by nextt year.
if we were about to have a kid in the next couple years, is there any currently available gene editing technology we could use to reduce genetic defects in the child? (or perhaps make them a super-kid?)
It is possible we could do this in the next few decades or so, but as more of a screening tool to determine if early treatment is needed. There are many cases where early intervention can prevent developmental disorders and don't require gene therapy at all. In addition, proof of concepts for gene therapies such as this have been successful in some animal models.
In the mean time I would totally encourage you to talk to a genetic councilor if you're interested in this. Here is a link to an FAQ from the National Society of Genetic Councilors https://www.nsgc.org/page/frequently-asked-questions-students. Genetic councilors evaluate a the parent's families medical histories and determine the chances your child is at risk of inheriting a genetic disorder.
Gene therapy has been around as early as 1990, albeit incredibly limited with not a lot of permanent success. We certainly aren't going to be curing stuff using gene therapy regurally for a while, let alone attempting to improve people.
That's definitely true, but it seems as though there are some fairly major breakthroughs coming in screening technology, which makes ivf a more attractive prospect. It's not curing anything, but it is an impact genetics will be likely to have in the relatively near future.
As another posted, is it possible to use CRISPR to make changes to an adult? For instance, wings, eye, and hair color?
Nope. Your window for that stuff is over before you're born. We can engineer single cells very well but to hit every cell in the body is a (possibly insurmountable) challenge. What is more likely on the horizon is making genetic modifications to implanted embryos. This is technically feasible but a whole can of worms ethically. Some of the things you mentioned like eye-color, might be doable as the eye is pretty insulated from the immune response and is one of the areas we've had a lot of success with gene therapy in.
I thought there had been some examples of transformation of adults using viral vectors - I seem to recall one study that gave some kind of tamarin or marmoset trichromatic vision by injecting the virus into the eyes.
Granted, these are probably localized changes, but how likely is it that viral vectors could be generalized to full-body interventions, or at least persistent interventions in a single organ of interest?
Hang on though. If my body can start cancer up which is a physical mutation that kills me, shouldn't it be able to grow wings? I don't mean today, I just mean in theory.
If you want to use the wings for something you also need to add insane amounts of muscles to drive them, upgrade your heart, metabolism, reduce your bone and other excess weight, and possibly completely change your lungs (birds have a different kind of respiratory system where they can more efficiently get the oxygen they need for flight).
Needless to say, these kind of things would require some scifi-level of tissue engineering to do on a live species.
There are companies raising capital for this as we type.
And there you have it, folks. You ain't growing your dick.
We'll see about that!
So is there another way around this (because the first thing I thought of was some sort of "de-aging ray" and then de-age someone into an embryo, modify their cells, then re-age them (because my mind is apparently stuck in the Silver Age))?
I'd prefer to just grow the part needed for replacement than risk having a clone escape and take over my life.
You can spread a gene to many cells by injecting an otherwise harmelss virus that does it. There has been some experiments to lengthen telomeres this way, which is suggested to increase cell lifespan. There's other potential anti-aging measures that this could be used for as well. See the SENS research project, or related subreddits for details.
It needs to be administered by injection and not as a ray, unfortunately, and if successful it would just restore the body towards a healthy state without cellular age related damage, not reverse the development process of the body.
Hello Resident Evil.
[deleted]
Thank you for the awesome response!
Unless we have zygote type origination cells as adults and we just dont know how to identify, find, or map them?
What if it really was that simple.. CSS for cells!
No, the few adult cells that have transformed would just turn over and die. Not enough and too short-lived to observe a phenotypic change
[deleted]
If we could figure out how to safely administer CRISPR-Cas9:sgRNA to nearly every cell in your body, and also get enough copies of the strand of desired DNA to be inserted in to the genome that the cell can readily add the strand by homology directed repair or non-homologous end-joining. If it was possible to do this, you could slowly replace the cells in someones body with the desired cells by mitosis and cell-death. However, to pass the genome on to progeny, you would need another human with the modification (and even then you wouldn't guarantee it).
Getting the CRISPR-Cas9:sgRNA in to the cell is incredibly hard. It has previously been done with viral vectors, where the RNA strand that codes for Cas9 and the sgRNA are injected by virus delivery -- the drawback of this technique being that the RNA template for Cas9 is not destroyed by the lysozyme and can be continuously transcribed. Delivering the Cas9:sgRNA complex in to the cell already transcribed has been recently carried out at a few labs around the country using a technique dubbed CRISPR-Gold, as it makes use of a gold-nanoparticle. It is currently being spun off in to a therapeutic company. However, it's not perfect.
In addition, sgRNAs are still not specific enough. The risk of off-target effects, though much better than other techniques, is still quite high, and this is (IMO) the major hurdle for CRISPR therapeutics. My work involves trying to lower off-target effects by studying the structure of the Cas9:sgRNA complex upon inspection of DNA. It's recently been shown that for on-target DNA, the Cas9:RNA:DNA complex goes straight from inactive to active upon DNA binding, but for off-target sites, the Cas9:RNA:DNA complex visits an intermediate state that acts as a vital checkpoint against off-target cleavage. This checkpoint gets it wrong every once in a while, which can lead to off-target effects, but if we can understand the structural mechanics of that transition, and hack it so that there is no chance of off-target effects, we could make RNA tags that are long enough to ensure very accurate targeting, and ensure structurally that off-target matches will not be cleaved. That's what I'm working toward currently.
Excuse me but I was under the impression that you wouldn't have to hit "every single cell" in your body, unless you're literally just attempting to do just that.
Would it really be the same level of effort to fix an eyeball vs changing every cell? Sounds like a pretty big leap.
It depends on what you're trying to do. If you're trying to turn a Downs or Duchenne's person in to a "normal" person through a therapeutic, yes, you have to hit every cell. If you're dealing with a smaller-scale problem, you only need to dose the area you want to effect.
So all i would need to do is get dosed in skin, ears, nose and reproduction area of dna choice, it would work possibly. Don't ask, just know im a furry
That's insane - How quickly do you think this kind of technology is moving?
VERY quickly. Some people are alarmed at the pace, some aren't. It really depends on how much you trust humans or the scientific process. I think history gives us a pretty mixed message. The upshot is, we are already at a place where we can place CRISPR-edited human genomes in to embryonic stem cells. We have also already developed "gene drives" created through CRISPR (for instance a 2016 paper by Hammond et al. that was able to mutate female mosquitos to make them sterile and stop the spread of mosquito-born illness -- they showed a transmission rate of >98% to progeny). These things, and many more, will only get more accurate and easier to carry out in the coming years. What we do with it, how it's regulated, etc. these are the real questions. People are trying to answer them. There have been large review papers published in high-impact journals attempting to lay out an ethical and practical framework to keep things in check -- problem is it's all voluntary. Labs in China, and all over the world can do whatever the fuck they want. They don't seem to have the same reservations about experimenting on human cells that we do.
I don't know whether to be excited or a little spooked. I read up a bit on the CRISPR Cas9 complex last night and it's incredible to me its mechanism of action. Do you know how we discovered the process in which we take over this bacteria's plasmids? It's incredible to me.
So... let me clear up a few things:
CRISPR is a system by which prokaryotes defend themselves from virus/plasmid attacks -- short snippets of viral/plasmid DNA are spliced and stored between palindromic repeat markers in the genome so that, when the prokaryote is attacked again, it can transcribe all the "tags" from past attacks, and the Cas proteins can use the tags to find the invader DNA and splice it, neutralizing it. This region of the prokaryotic genome was discovered in the late 1980s but was not looked in to in greater detail for about a decade. What we have been able to do is hijack the Cas9 protein (Type II CRISPR) and tags for other uses. Because the tags so accurately guide the Cas9 to a target segment of DNA, and splice in a very reliable and efficient manner, it is easily repurposed as a genetic/epigenetic editing tool.
God damn isn't it amazing that we've managed to isolate and hijack it? I imagine the first person to begin this discovery was blown away.
I agree, it must have been wild to see these proteins splice DNA for the first time
On technicality, it is absolutely possible to manipulate adult genomes right now. All you need to do is irradiate the shit out of yourself.
However, doing so in a targeted and homogeneous manner that is presumably beneficial to the organism is the challenge. Using genome editing tech on pluripotent embryonic cells prior to terminal differentiation is a rational approach to this.
And targeted viral delivery is a potential solution for cell populations that have adopted malignant characteristics. Particularly cancer cell clusters which have reprogrammed their own stemness.
"Any point" is vague. For the foreseeable future, not on a scale that would cause things like observable phenotypes.
Unless we identify cascade-choke points and target those cells?
So it has no use for solving genetic illness in adults ? Why is everyone so excited by it then..
Yeah, it only helps future generations, why should we give a shit about them.
It helps them but peoples excitement implies it helps us now. But it doesn't.. plenty people now suffering and this focus on helping the future is great but it implies we might forget about the present.
That's... really not an argument against this. Also I think people are misunderstanding what /r/fabreeze is repsponding to exactly. Attempting to grow a pair of wings or a third eye in an adult is probably going to be impossible in the next millennium, except if we find some kind of way to coordinate stem cells.
But if you have a genetic disease, of which 99% involve being unable to produce a specific protein in a specific body part, then chances are that that's already curable right now, since it would be such a simple change to a small amount of cells.
But how come we don't see these cures right now ? I presume its all active research ? I'm really confused on what potential CRISPR has for our generation now, forget the non sense of wings and stuff i don't care about that lol I care about solving people who are suffering now and how can CRISPR help in that regard.
It is as you say, it's still active research. We pretty much already know everything we need to do this, but the process for developing and releasing new drugs is notoriously tedious (for good reason) and can take several years to even get to human trials.
Still, it's not so much active research as it's pretty much practical reality at this point, for example in this study where congenital muscular dystrophy was pretty much cured in lab rats.
How likely would it be for a dedicated team to make some nasty stuff with a kit like this one ? IMHO we're opening the Pandora box.
With this kit alone, pretty much impossible. You'd at least need to modify the guide RNA (the part that acts like a homing signal for the DNA modification). That would take some cloning, which isn't hard to do, but requires more stuff. Also, if you wanted to make something nasty, you wouldn't need or use CRISPR technology. The breakthrough, is being able to target specific locations of the genome. We've been able to modify the genomes of microorganisms for decades.
Edit (back at my desk now): Funny thing, we actually had this exact debate about restriction enzymes in the 70's (https://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/ps/retrieve/Narrative/DJ/p-nid/218).
This is fantastic, thanks for the link!
The technology for making nuclear weapons has been around for nearly 70 years and we have yet to see anyone even make so much as a dirty bomb. And that's also in a field where dozens of Nations have clear designs and thousands of experts on the subject.
As much as people think this is opening a door to make mutants or superweapons genetics isn't nearly simple enough to just do random shit like that. It's taken decades of research and huge amounts of money to just know what the sequences are, let alone what those sequences even do.
I totally agree with your second statement but there are no privately made nuclear warheads because the components are illegal or near impossible to obtain. I do not know about the instruments for crispr, id est how expensive they are and or how easy they can be operated. If it is too easy or cheap, laws will be required to prevent them getting into the wrong hands.
Anyone with access to a beauty supply store can buy the ingredients needed to make an extremely powerful and volatile explosive which cannot be detected with explosives detectors. When you read about some bomb-maker in Iraq or Afghanistan accidentally blowing themselves up in their make-shift labs, it is usually because of mistakes they made in preparing this explosive.
However, people in this country just don't attempt it. The materials are legal and inexpensive, and anyone who paid attention in high school chemistry should know how to make it, but people just don't try to make it.
Laws don't keep people safe. Lack of pervasive desperation in a society keeps people safe.
That is...oddly specific.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acetone_peroxide
Anyone with access to both a beauty supply store and an automotive supply store can also make
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piranha_solution
which will reduce a body to black sludge, as seen in Breaking Bad and Mythbusters. Anyone seeking knowledge can find it all over the internet.
People have the ability to do all kinds of horrible things, but it's extremely rare that any of us do. Most of humanity is basically good, so long as we are free to earn a decent living and otherwise pretty much do and say whatever we please. Freedom, by and large, is safety.
A lot of people got on a lot of lists today. Thanks for sharing the info though.
If everyone is on all the lists, there are no lists.
That's only true if the lists aren't ordered. /math
Yo you seem like a dope person. If you're ever in Austin Texas hit me up and we can grab a beer.
Nice try fbi
I'm about 45 minutes away in Killeen. I don't drink, but if you ever want to meetup at Hippie Hollow (weather permitting), let me know.
Here is a pic of MadCervantes so you can find each other easier at the bar.
https://img-aws.ehowcdn.com/750x428p/s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/contentlab.studiod/getty/6556cfed00fb400f8135e573d0713862
Dang you got me!
Well that was an interesting read.
Extremely rare that people do horrible things?
Or extremely rare that we know people do those horrible things?
It's pretty difficult to blow something up without people knowing about it.
[deleted]
If you live in a free and prosperous country, they occur almost never.
Happened more than a thousand times a year during the 60s. That’s why most people over 60 roll their eyes whenever they’re told to be afraid of whatever random thing the media sensationalizes tomorrow, they lived through far worse.
'Legal' but it will still get you on a list especially if youre purchasing high grade explosive ingredients. Like how 99% Hydrogen peroxide always turns eyes
I assume that I'm on every list. In fact, I consider it a duty of well-meaning, good people everywhere to be on as many lists as possible. The lists are attempts to circumvent due process. They should be made meaningless and non-functional.
Do you think genes are something someone can just pull out of your ass and plug into a enzyme like a computer and go to work? CRISPR makes it easier, but not basement level easier.
This shit takes massive labs and hundreds of millions of dollars to work out. No schmuck in his garage or cave is going to be able to customize organisms on the fly, just as much as they would be able to make nuclear material.
Thousands, not millions, of dollars.
Genome at Home: Biohackers Build Their Own Labs
https://www.wired.com/2011/08/mf_diylab/
Those labs are like comparing a meth lab to a pharmaceutical company or a 1950s Chinese backyard steel furnace to a steel factory.
It takes a lot more than PCR and test tubes to do any real genetic research. It takes years upon years and millions in funding just to figure out what the hell the sequence codes for, let alone finding a way to properly splice it into foreign DNA and making viable embryos.
Well yeah, it's not an article about clean rooms and hundred million dollar genetic labs, it's about homebrew DIY labs which are trying to do similar manipulation, not necessarily research. Sure, the end results may not be viable embryos, but the cost is far less than hundreds of millions and likely will get cheaper in the very near future.
The article you linked is not about manipulation. PCR just copies an already existing chunk of DNA tons of times so a sample can contain enough for easy analysis. It's really cool what they're doing to make things more accessible but this is also a process I, and many others, did in high school genetics classes years ago. It's so many light years away from the kind of alarm bells people are ringing about CRISPR it's hardly even relevant.
As far as CRISPR goes even if the technology is available to people the learning curve is enormous. The article you linked even explains that the barrier to entry for PCR was not skill based but purely related to the cost of the equipment. To do anything malicious with this technology would require so much time and knowhow as well as funding for all of the other equipment necessary to actually make use of CRISPR. The people we should be worried about with this technology are not the individuals, it's the governments and large corporations who already have these resources that we need to watch out for. Why are we scared of some dude fucking around in his basement when we know DARPA actually has the resources and motivation to make some seriously nasty shit?
Honestly at this point it feels insulting to all the work geneticists are putting in to make progress in the field when people act like anyone with a free weekend and the right tools can just put together something worthwhile entirely independently.
Never nodded so often and vehement while reading a comment. I can feel your frustration through the screen.
What the hell does "manipulation" mean? Just throwing shit together and seeing if it grows is exactly what these multi-billion dollar companies are doing, just in a more refined way.
None of these labs are going to unlock the secrets of generic engineering, at best they will try to replicate what actual labs have already confirmed.
The question is regarding the amount of damage that can be done by someone who is creating stuff just for shits and giggles.
I have no idea, really. That is why it is asked here.
About as much damage as a kid can do with a chemistry set they got for their birthday.
This is just the beginning. Your phone right now is probably more powerful than anything NASA had in the 50s
Biology is far more complicated than computers are though.
It's been nearly 30 years since cloning and genetic modification came out and as of now only a few tightly controlled experiments have been successful. And that's with billions being put into it.
[deleted]
Your professor was grossly exaggerating then or dealing with hypotheticals. Bio weapons aren't terrible, you can grow anthrax and diseases without much. But modifying them? That takes an excessive amount of trial and error and a lot of resources.
Tell that to Tony Stark, look at what he accomplished in a cave... We just need to trap a billionaire Genius in a cave for a few months with only the kit. Then we will see what’s really possible.
But then we'll have supervillains coming out of the woodwork and the studio controlling our universe will have to keep making more and more installments or the world will end because the story's over /s
Yeah when you don't have to be pestered by that pesky reality you can do anything /s
David Hahn
Still doesn't change the mind of a common person. You wouldn't believe how many people get so nervous at work when we tell them about nuclear medicine. They think omg radiation poisoning etc and for the most part is super safe but the patients are ignorant about what the tests consist of because of the simple word nuclear.
Any hope with CRISPR to stop male and female baldness (MBP/AGA)?
Long term? CRISPR is powerful enough that we can potentially design something even more powerful gene editing with it, so it's almost unquestionable that it's within reach at this point.
Short term? We don't know how to design intentional reactions at this point. We're effectively children, finding things in nature and copying them to see how they work. We're no where near the stage of being able to intentionally edit the human genome short of copy pasting genes we know work better into someone. Baldness in men is a direct effect of strong testosterone, so fixing it isn't necessarily simple at the copy/past stage unlike say cystic fibrosis.
It'll come, but there's no guarantee it'll be within our lifetime. I do think the fabled "last mortals" are going to be born soon, but I think we're 100-200 years too early at this point to be part of that generation.
Baldness isn't strong test. It's high sensitivity to test particularly in the hair follicles. Has to do with the lutenizing hormones if I remember correctly.
Thanks for providing that insight, I'll stick to my dermaroller then.
On a less serious note, two psychics have read my lifeline and say that I should expect to live past 150. So, I'd be careful on discounting the advent of the last mortals just yet.. ;)
So will the generation beyond the last mortals have infinitely long lifelines? Or will they just become proportional and represent the length of their life until death from non-natural causes?
Haha do you sign up for a lot of genetic modification studies at local universities? Side effects may include, but are not limited to, additional limbs & prostheses, a lustrous coat of body hair, and amnesia during the full moon.
Stem cells seem a more promising solution. Japanese firm claim they aiming for commercialization by 2020
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jboyd/2016/07/13/stem-cells-to-make-hair-today-gone-tomorrow-a-thing-of-the-past/#7e5f1be45c04
Right now they are focusing on trying to solve actual problems like cancer, sickle cell, and other genetic abnormalities, and even that has barely reached past the on paper phases.
Gene therapy has been around since 1990, but at best the effects are temporary or at worst you cause more problems. General inconveniences and benefits are decades beyond what we're capable of.
Remind me how much money Viagra pulls in again?
Giving you a chemically induced erection is a lot easier than rewriting DNA and making sure it sticks.
But imagine if they had a length and girth shot! Every home in America would be ordering one right away. Maybe even double. Or what about a second wee wee?
Hey fucker being bald is an actual problem for me!
Do you have any idea why that is the case?
a) making nuclear material is as expensive as all fuck.
b) keeping a pile of nuclear material unknown to multiple governments is 'very hard' when the amount of material you have is more than a thimble full.
c) Israeli assassins will come kill you if they think you could be building a bomb for use against Israel. Or at least they will drop some bombs on you.
d) Many, if not most, countries have sensors around that pick up the movement of nuclear material. Just move enough cat litter and bananas in the US and you'll find out.
Meanwhile, genetic material doesn't announce itself to the people around you with high energy gamma rays. It generally doesn't try to kill the people working with it. In theory all the materials needed to work with genetics is cheap and relatively small, so it could be concealed from government agencies easily.
This is a typical sequence you would use
This shit isn't nuclear science dude, it's a lot harder than that. At least in nuclear science you have half a fucking clue what does what. Even today most geneticist have no idea what the vast majority of DNA codes for, let alone splicing shit together and making it.
I see what you are saying, but imagine if, one day, there was a way to synthesize a material that was genetic specific or even just human specific that would make people into time bombs that would die or something else bad, but by the time anyone knew... it is already in everyone
You mean like most disease already?
Yes but genetic changes at the DNA level would go right past immune system for a very high % success rate compared to a virus which would have a fast incubation period but wouldnt spread before it is detected, rather it would be detected as soon as people show symptoms
Maybe a very long incubation period virus or asymptomatic.. can people engineer that kind of stuff?
I mean, that's part luck though in terms of what our specific physical laws allow. If we imagine an alternative reality were regular gun powder had the explosive power of nuclear weapons, I have a hard time seeing the human race having made it to the 21st century.
We shouldn't just brush off the possibility of something with an extremely high "destructive capability" to "ease of creation" ratio, just because we haven't encountered it in our tech tree yet.
So when can I make a Zombie Virus so I don't have to worry about my day to day responsibilities?
Not that this has anything to do with Nukes, but while we're on the subject of harmful technologies being misused in the world today to the detriment of mankind, let's consider for a moment such great companies as Monsanto & other cos like them and what they've done and continue to do unto our gene pool and ecosystem. facepalm
When the consequences aren't as obvious or easily noticed people have a funny way of pretending it's all good in da hood, but it ain't.
WRONG. there have been many attempts to make nuclear weapons, but the components are illegal. It doesn't mean amatuer scientists haven't tried to get them from hording fire alarm devices that have minute quantities of uranium. Look it up, it's a thing.
WRONG...see I can do this too, it doesn't add anything though.
Genetic modification is heavily regulated and much harder. Major companies have a massive failure rate when it comes to GMOs with all their funding. So how exactly do you think a dude in their basement is going to succeed?
We're not talking about one dude in his basement. We're talking about millions of dudes in millions of basements.
Most of them will end up looking like inbred cannibal rednecks, but some of them will find something more interesting and useful.
No because it doesn't work like that. It like saying they could all get to the moon if they started building rockets.
This kind of stuff takes a shit to of time and resources, more than what a few basement labs are capable of.
[deleted]
Perhaps if you read the article maybe you would figure it out. The kit is the equivalent of a chemistry set. It's literally follow directions and see some white spots on a petri dish.
Literally all the hard work has been done for you, it's a god damn toy.
IMHO your opinion is based on dystopian sci-fi movies
And what would be informing that opinion I wonder?
This is a really basis question but for someone with little understand of chemistry or biology, what is CRISPR actually? What are you tangibly interacting with? Is it a machine? A bunch of different liquids?
It's DNA suspended in liquid (mostly water). The DNA is transfered into the cells that we want to edit and they make the Cas9 protein and guide RNA (that makes up the CRISPR system) using the instructions on the DNA we gave them.
How do you give the DNA instructions?
By associating it with a guide RNA molecule. The guide RNA guides the CRISPR system to the part that needs to be cut out. After the DNA gets cut out from the original DNA molecule, the original DNA molecule has overhanging parts that act like highly specific velcro wherein you can make a complementary piece of DNA (with your gene of interest) with matching velcro bits to shove into the original DNA
What are you personally interacting with?
Why the fuck haven't we cured balding?
Balding is caused by a molecule called DHT (similar to testosterone) binding to receptors in your hair follicles called androgen receptors. Some people's androgen receptors are overly sensitive to DHT, which leads to a shrinkage of the follicle and causes baldness. This is actually a case where Ex-vivo gene therapy might work. By taking some of the patients cells, culturing them, replacing the allele responsible for the androgen receptor mutation, and putting them back, you might be able to cure baldness. The issue is, that is a lot of work and risk for one person for what is not a life threatening condition (not to minimize the issue, I know it sucks).
Thanks for the info!! It does totally suck, and I'm bored off hearing the common advice on reddit of "just embrace it and shave your head". My head is like a shiny, scarred and dented melon ... There is no embracing it!!!
I've known a few men who had good results from hair plugs
Happy cake day! Do you know how many times they had to do it, and the rough cost?
I would have to ask, it was just something mentioned off hand. I would not have known if they had not mentioned it (two brothers), it looked pretty natural.
Otherwise your options look like Rogaine (minoxidil), Propecia (finasteride) and Azeleic Acid which are all topical. Some people claim MSM and Biotin supplements help. Bald spots can also be covered up with tattoos now that look surprisingly natural (eyebrow tatoos look damn good IMO). Careprost might also work it is just expensive.
Personally I tried using Rogain to grow out my eyebrows and I sprouted extra eyelashes, like literally an extra row on top of my pre-existing eyebrows. Mye eyebrows did grow out too. So while I'm not balding I think Rogaine might be the real deal.
[deleted]
I feel like I hear this argument all the time in reference to chemo treatments for cancer, but in reality there is seriously so much more money in curing disease than treating chronic disease.
source- cancer researcher
Yeah exactly - it's not like there will ever be a shortage of customers for baldness or cancer. New people would need the cure all the time.
Even if there were a way to outright prevent cancer from ever occurring, now you are just selling to the entire planet and people keep being born. Plus, that would eliminate the need to new R&D so...a fully preventive cure would be the absolute best solution for a drug company.
A competitor would easily prefer to make money selling a cure over letting some company sell a treatment to manage it...
[deleted]
More people are born and will continue buying it.. are you not aware that ageing is a thing in our species or something? Every year new people start balding as they age.
[deleted]
You seem to not understand how markets work. One company owns a product and sells it continuously as you refer to. So if a rival company finds a cure and steals their thunder why the hell wouldn't they do that instead of allowing a competitor just get money?
If they can't find a treatment (research for it is mega mega money - but CRISPR is a lot cheaper so a cure is cheaper for a startup) or there is tons of patents and/or legal battles to deal with selling a treament, find a cure if one is possible in CRISPR instead since no legal patents exist - be the first and you're golden. Who ever does it first is guaranteed to be wealthy beyond belief. You would be crazy not to.
[deleted]
Thats because your point is invalid. Its like any thing some one will try to rival your product by being better to make a profit. Theres only so many "treatments" you can research before theres none left and all that exist are patented by companies, so your next best option to make a profit is be the first to get the cure, since no one can have a second cure you will win the market forever.
Dude, there so much more money in a cure for baldness. You could like charge 500$ a month, and millions would sign up without hesitation.
Happy bald guy checking in. Fuck it, if my hair doesn't want me, I don't want it.
Exactly man, by my mid 20's it was obvious that I was slowly losing the battle and by the time I was 30 I started shaving my head. Doesn't bother me a bit. Except when its cold out.
I just want to let you know the way you introduced yourself brought a super depressing image into my eyes. Hope you are doing ok, buddy.
Tried Rogaine and everything else.
Am bald.
Because you'd have to block DHT production which comes with a bunch of other problems.
I don't want your excuses.... I want results!!!!!
Would CRISPR be able to be easily used to eliminate my allergies or asthma? Really sick and tired of being stuffed up and out of breath without expensive medicine
State your qualifications?
PhD candidate in genetics doing work with CRISPR/Cas9. My work also involves lentivirus and stem cell culture if you have questions regarding that, or just about anything related to genetic engineering or gene therapy.
Is In Vivo genetic alteration possible or a pipe dream?
I know a startup that has patented lentiviruses that encapsulate the whole Cas9 protein+its RNA guide.
Still not able to enter all cells in the body at once but still a much better rate than the earlier efforts to use lentiviruses to bring only the DNA that encodes Cas9 and his guide and to hope for it to be expressed
this is some Orphan Black level shit.
Not at all. It really depends on what you want to do though. If you want to replace a missing protein, sometimes just a few altered cells are enough to fix a genetic disorder. If you want to grow wings, have super powers etc.. I'm afraid it's too late for you. If you want your kid to have super powers... then maybe we can talk. There is also a lot of promise in in-vitro alteration of stem cells which can then be culture and placed back in the body.
Is there another way to do that other than have the scientist go back in time to convince your parents that their kid (you) should have superpowers or whatever?
Not with modern science. Better delivery methods are being worked on, but right now we can’t deliver a gene to a significant portion of the body’s cells.
Also, if you’re talking about having wings, even if you add the gene for wings to yourself you won’t just grow wings, for the same reason a severed arm won’t re-grow. Development is done. Not that it’s physically impossible, but you’d have to essentially find a way to put the body back in to a fetus-like state. And that kind of knowledge about the body is hundreds of years off.
I'd be hesitant about saying hundreds of years off. Science has progressed more in the last fifty years than the last thousand. Our pace of advancement has been explosive. Not to mention that we've actually done that in mice (though we can do basically anything in mice, so it only goes so far).
Yeah......please let cyborgs be a thing in the future. It would at least give regular human beings a chance to match with humans.
I have a bachelors in Biotech and do all that at my job already :-p.
Most days I'm in a bit over my head.
How much money goes your position make
I think you made a typo
PhD Candidate, so you've only got a masters?
You should do an actual AMA instead of one in the comments. I think it would blow up quite big. There are a lot of curious people out there, and this potentially effects a major population of people.
Can I turn on a gene that will allow my liver to produce CYP2D6 enzyme? I have a chronic pain condition and the enzyme that metabolises opiate based painkillers and SSRI's is missing in my body.
As I am not a medical doctor, I can only answer from the point of view if it is technically feasible. That said, A quick literature search doesn't turn up much in the way of active research on CYP2D6 deficiency. However the liver is an organ where a lot of gene therapy research has been done. There are two ways to target the liver, both with advantages and drawbacks. First, in-vivo gene therapy would involve using viral or lipid particles to deliver working copies of the CYP2D6 enzyme. The advantage of this is it's not very invasive, the disadvantage is that your immune system will suppress many of these particles and those that do make it through will likely not be on long term. The other option would would be Ex-vivo, which involves culturing cells that have the working enzyme and transplanting them into your body. This would be similar to a partial liver transplant, however it's a more invasive approach and I don't know whether a medical doctor would consider this a good idea.
When will you guys cure type one diabetes?
Can you make me a pygmy pet elephant?
No, you're too old and were born human. Seriously though yes. Just like dog breeds, elephants could be miniaturized if we found the right genes to do so. I make no guarantees on the health of such an elephant.
Would it be possible to isolate the gene that causes an allergic reaction to say peanuts and then CRISPR it out?
EDIT: On the opposite end would it be possible to "heal" allergies in people using CRISPR?
There is a strong case for peanut allergies being heritable and with further research we might be able to prevent them before birth. As is the case with many gene-therapies in adults, the delivery mechanism for getting the right DNA to the right cells is still the major issue. We can modify one cell easily in a dish, we can't modify all the cells in the human body at once. That said, some cancer targeting related strategies could work for severe allergies, but I'm not sure it would be worth the risk and this is very blue-sky thinking.
I want a tail. Are we close to body mods like that?
What do I need to go to college for, to start learning this stuff? What are the applicable classes and Skills?
FYI, I'm planning to go back to college now that I actually care about studying a certain subject. This whole thing is just, fascinating and under rated to me.
I would start by getting a Bachelors in molecular biology or genetics and get yourself involved in undergraduate research. Make sure you're at a school where the professors do research (not just teach) and ask around for what professors take on undergraduates. I spent every summer in a research lab during collage and much of the semester as well. Afterwards either work as a research tech for a bit or go straight to a PhD if you find you like the lab part. The important thing is that you get a feel for what it's like being in a lab and find out whether or not that's for you.
Is CRISPR over hyped regarding its potential ?
Would I be able to make my own treatment for cystic fibrosis. Like say create an inhalable solution that is capable of editing my own cells.
Could one alter themselves to cure their asthma.
How possible is it for an amateur to genetically modify plant crops, simple weeds or tomatoes/corn?
Have you heard of those university students who modified the yeast to produce morphine beer? Can I do that with this crisper kit?
Link to what I'm talking about, http://www.bbc.com/news/health-32780624
Got any ideas on how to make a Dragon?
Can you hook me up with some genes to jump higher. I’m a white guy, plz help.
[deleted]
Skillet-Roasted Potatoes with Garlic and Rosemary from America's Test Kitchen. We like it so much my girlfriend and I use the word "potato" when we want to say something is good. Your question was very potato.
[deleted]
If you read the article the kit might as well be a biology version of those chemistry kits you gave your kid for birthday present. It's basically a "follow the directions and watch white circles pop up on your petri dish" game.
How many people come to you to create the healthiest baby by nitpicking favorable genes to avoid passing on disease cause genes and alleles?
None, but if they did I'd refer them to a genetic councilor (https://www.nsgc.org/page/frequently-asked-questions-students).
How does it work?
I’m currently a senior at Iowa State with an interest in CRISPR DNA as I have used some of this technology in a previous lab. I was wondering what you are using the crispr dna on and what you’re trying to accomplish with this technology.
Why was OP's article so unnecessarily long?
When you figure out how to grow articular cartilage, call me.
Will I be able to edit my eye/hair colour at random down the road?
Sincerely, someone who really wants blue eyes.
Can I use CRISPR to make antibodies that target specific things in the body? (Homebrew gene therapy)
I have a project I've wanted to do for years but it's not my field.
what company out of the big 3 (Editas, Intellia, and Crispr) do you see succeeding the most/becoming the big name in CRISPR in the future?
That sounds like a cool job. May I ask how you got into it? What kind of degree do you have? Is it tough to start out in that field of work?
Thanks for taking the time!
From what I'm reading crispr seems very singular/embryo based. Is there a way for the best scientists with big funding to weaponize something on a medium/large scale. Can this make different better diseases? Can they make mosquitos breed faster and with a disease (did they use something like this to "neuter" mosquitoes)
Just for curiosities sake, most things can be used for ill.
Could we use this to 'edit' mosquitoes so they say, 'carry vaccines' for want of a better term? Imagine, LETTING a mozzie bite you cos its got your polio shot in it lol
Edit: Sometimes i hit 'c' instead of 'space.'
If a student chose to make genetics a career, how financialy secure should they expect to be? What is the job outlook/demand for professionals in this field? Could they expect to be well payed and have a reliable source of steady income?
How hard would it be with this type of kit to produce some sort of hybrid life form?
All the CRISPR articles do what this one did: "...to make our guide RNA from scratch—we first synthesized DNA strands with a specific sequence we wanted, used that as a template for..."
ie they skip over the bit about how you get from genetic data (such as on a computer) to an actual string of custom-built DNA floating in solution.
What is involved in creating a designer section of DNA? Are thousands of base pairs often involved? Wouldn't that mean thousands of lab steps to "write" the string? How reliable is that? Is it done by hand or machine? etc.
Hi, I studied biotech for 4 years before I did an 180 and went for computer programming. So I'm really curious at the opportunity to try and fiddle with these kits at home. I used to work at a plant lab with arabidopsis and tobacco plants, and we did the older way of mutating plants to be more resistant to the environment. We dipped them into the media..... Anyway:.
I was curious as to see the actual pathway that the CRISPR takes, and how this is done. Or could you link me to a more detailed site, book, or article?
I think this could be a really great hobby.
Okay but if every cell in the body is rebirthed in like 7 years, for example, let's say I use CRISPR to turn skin cells blue, and with a virus I spread that modification to every cell, then in 7 years I'll have blue skin?
Why didnt TALON recieve as widespread appreciation as crispr when its much more accurate in ur opinion?
How difficult would it be to alter the colour of a flower by adding dna(?) from another species of flower
I’m not worried about unqualified or unethical people making changes to multicellular organisms at this point, but bacteria and viruses. How concerned should we be that a rouge scientist or even hostile nation creates a new smallpox, flu, or other disease which our current treatments might be ineffective? CRISPR seems like the prime opportunity for a terrible person to create a terrible new epidemic.
Yeah - how to I set myself up to work in your industry in the future?
Could an amatuer without specialized education accomplish anything remotely remarkable with access to this device?
Could a non-amatuer with malicious intent use access to this device to create something that can hurt people?
Can crispr be used on auto immune diseases?
Can I give myself wings like a bat?
Would it be possible for people to undermine the drug cartels by engineering yeast or similar to produce heroin or cocaine?
That is, do plant extracts have to be made by plants, and if not, is this the right tool for the job?
Can it cure albinism or bleeding dissorders like HPS?
I know the scientific community is currently throttling ideas that COULD be done, to determine if they SHOULD be done.
Won't the proliferation of DIY crispr kits and labs like the one in the story lead to someone just taking the plunge and developing project the community isn't currently willing to move forward with. (Ie, a malaria resistant mosquito with a gene-drive.)
how hard would it be to edit cold-hardiness into plants?
My friend got a kit for her bday. What type of lab equipment could I possibly 3D print for her?
How are you trying to deal with the fact that splitting the DNA for editing may lead to mutations?
Would it be possible to give an adult man gills?
As a biology senior I find this unsettling, especially the lack of concern for the E. Coli just because it was non-pathogenic, you?
Eternal life with lobsters? Zombie apocalypse? Gene selection? What are the most probable use for CRISPR for today? The first two are probably ridiculous.
Would it be possible (even in theory) to modify the ephedra plant to produce meth instead of pseudo/ephedrine?
Seems a matter of time before someone brews some dangerous virus or bacteria at home, no? Much easier than modifying complex creatures.
So after reading some responses I'm getting the gist of some of it. So i have a question. I keep a big flower garden, complete with breeding insects (butterflies, ladybugs etc) just pretty flowers and pretty bugs. So would this be usable on bug eggs (or any other transformative stage) to influence their genes towards preferred coloring or to encourage over enthusiastic brightness/colour? Additionally, would these traits then pass on, or be restricted to only that generation?
Ok let say I wan't to try a CRISPR experiment at home. I want to put amylase gene into yeasts. My final test is that yeast should be able to grow on floors or potatoes.
So what's the steps?
How I find the amylase gene?
Are these kit generic enough to work on yeast (plants, bacterias, animal cells)?
Just would like a whole idea of what can be done by hobbyist and what is the scope of this project. Is it something we do in a weekend? Something we do in several years?
Is it possible to take the gene that encodes for Amphibian Traits within Frogs and inject it into humans? Will this person become Amphibious?
[deleted]
According to OP's other comments, not at all. This is complicated shit that only good scientists with tons of funding can use to even make slight changes. I hope OP replies to you soon to elaborate a bit more.
Not even a bit. It's incredibly difficult to do ANYTHING intentional in biology even with funding and state of the art equipment. Also the stuff you're talking about could be done long before CRISPR ;) so no reason to worry more now right?
deleted ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^0.8127 ^^^What ^^^is ^^^this?
I use the CRISPR in my fridge from time to time but i don't really notice any difference. Does it actually do anything or is it just a selling point that has become a standard feature?
Yo can I manage to make a cat the size of a dog or something?
Can I edit a pet octopus to have fingers/hands?
Would something like this be sufficient for creating a suicide mosquito?
Can I look like Arnold Schwarzenegger in his prime?
I know this is an incredibly old thread but I’m hoping you see this. If I bought a crispr kit today, learned the necessary information to use it, could I theoretically use it to reduce my pain response by 80%? I have chronic pain and it makes life miserable which is a tough thing to face when you developed it at only 22 and have an entire lifetime of it ahead. The knowledge that we are on the verge of that being a treatment option would give me such hope, even if not for myself but for others in similar situations in the future. I know they’ve had degrees of success in mice so I’m curious if this is something that could be done in humans today or if we are a long way off from it.
No worries. I've been answering questions on this thread for about 5 years now. It seems to pop up in searches now and then. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but the answer to your question is no. I live with chronic pain myself and feel for you, but this isn't a viable home-brew solution. These kits are genetic parlor tricks. They do have some useful constructs in them that, with a lab, you could do some standard CRISPR stuff with, but you'll need A LOT more than what comes in one of these kits to accomplish anything more than what they are designed for. The good news is, as you mentioned, there are people working on this the initial results do look promising.
But don't get too hung up on CRISPR as being the only option. You should also look into "Zinc Fingers" as another way to target genetic regions. They have actually been around longer than CRISPR has been in use and have some advantages when it comes to therapeutics (for instance they don't need to express dCas9 to work).
If you're really interested in this and want to work on it, I would encourage pursuing studies in genetics to learn more. Happy holidays and best of luck.
What about spinocerebrellum ataxia?