Lawmakers in the United Kingdom voted recently to allow fertility clinics to use mitochondrial manipulation technology (MMT) to enable women with mutations in mitochondrial genes to have genetically healthy children . But the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is being much more conservative and is awaiting results of further preclinical research before allowing clinical trials to begin. The technology is of concern because it manipulates the germline, something many countries prohibit.
Tag: genes
U.K. Parliament Approves Controversial Three-Parent Mitochondrial Gene Therapy
The United Kingdom’s House of Commons voted overwhelmingly today to allow British researchers to pursue a new fertility treatment that could prevent certain kinds of genetic diseases. The technique, called mitochondrial DNA replacement therapy, could allow women who carry disease-causing mutations in their mitochondrial genes to give birth to genetically related children free of mitochondrial disease.
Safety First: MPs Are In a Quandary Over a Vote on a New IVF Technique
It has been a long-standing rule in fertility treatment that no
scientist should attempt to modify the genes of a human embryo if that
modification can be passed on to subsequent generations through the
“germline” – the eggs and sperm of the future person. Now Parliament is
about to consider another form of germline modification, so-called
“three-parent embryos”, this time involving the genes of the
mitochondria, described as the tiny “power packs” of the cell, which
exist outside the nucleus.
Mutation Boosts Paternal Age’s Autism-Like Effects in Mice
Mice born to older males with mutations in PAX6 — a gene involved in brain development — vocalize less than those with younger dads. The unpublished findings, presented today at the 2014 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting in Washington, D.C., suggest how genes and paternal age can work together to trigger symptoms.
Three-parent Babies: ‘As Long as She’s Healthy, I Don’t Care’, Says Mother of IVF Child
In May 1997, the first child was born as a result of a controversial IVF technique which involved mixing the genes of three people. Today, Emma Ott, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is a healthy American teenager who routinely scores straight As at high school.
Researchers See New Importance in Y Chromosome
There is new reason to respect the diminutive male Y chromosome.Besides its long-known role of reversing the default state of being female, the Y chromosome includes genes required for the general operation of the genome, according to two new surveys of its evolutionary history. These genes may represent a fundamental difference in how the cells in men’s and women’s bodies read off the information in their genomes.
Endometriosis Cause And Development Linked To Unstudied Genes
A study from Northwestern Medicine has led to a new theory regarding the development and cause of endometriosis. The chronically painful disease, which affects 1 in 10 women, has been linked to two previously unstudied genes.
To Catch a Killer Gene: Sisters Race to Stop Mystery Disease
America is experiencing a boom in biological fortune-telling. Doctors can now scan the genes of a fetus using only a drop of the mother’s blood, testing for hundreds of known mutations, including Down syndrome. Soon they’ll be able to detect a growing list of rare mutations—almost none of them treatable—and predict an embryo’s risk of more common ailments like diabetes, cancer, and heart disease
Ethics Questions Arise as Genetic Testing of Embryos Increases
Genetic testing of embryos has been around for more than a decade, but its use has soared in recent years as methods have improved and more disease-causing genes have been discovered. The in vitro fertilization and testing are expensive — typically about $20,000 — but they make it possible for couples to ensure that their children will not inherit a faulty gene and to avoid the difficult choice of whether to abort a pregnancy if testing of a fetus detects a genetic problem.
Male Chromosome Is Not Dying Out: Study
Scientists have challenged the theory that genes of male Y chromosome are mostly unimportant and that the chromosome is destined to disappear.