New Method Of Gene-Editing Could Result In Super-Baby

Recently, a group of researchers from China has found a new way to increase 3 fold a gene-editing tool's efficiency. This tool is used to edit human embryos' genes.  In an interview between the leading researcher of the project, Yang Hui and Chinese newspaper SCMP, she said that they plan to get this new method ready for clinical usage very soon. With this new tech, we could expect babies with edited genes to be available in the next couple of years.

However, even Yang Hui is quite concerned that the technological breakthrough of her team could lead to dire consequences.

She said:

The center technology of the research has the name of base editing.  It is about changing a "letter" or DNA nucleotide.

In fact, it is a CRISPR variant. But they consider it as a safer option than CRISPR because with base editing you don't have to cut any strands of DNA.

To conduct this study (which have been published on the Genome Biology journal), Yang Hui and her team have injected a type of base editor made for mutation correction into the human embryos at the two-cell developing stage. That method has shown to correct up to 80% of the mutations in comparison with 30% of the old method of injecting at the single-cell developing stage.

Yang also stated that her team is now working to achieve an almost 100% efficiency. Considering the timeline she has planned, the Chinese government will have to regulate this new technology quickly to avoid the risk of gray-market using it to create superhumans.