nec209 Posted July 23, 2011 Posted July 23, 2011 The fast-moving field of mixing animal and human DNA may need new ethical or regulatory boundaries for some experiments, a British panel says. Read about it here http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2011/07/22/animal-human-experiments-uk.html Note can some one explain to me at grade 5 level what the controversy is and what they are scared nay happen.
Brainteaserfan Posted July 23, 2011 Posted July 23, 2011 (edited) Note can some one explain to me at grade 5 level what the controversy is and what they are scared nay happen. I think they are worried about religious protests mostly. We could discuss that in the religion forum. Still, the idea of a partly human animal is, IMO, rather scary. Can you imagine an intelligent snake? Makes me shudder! Edited July 23, 2011 by Brainteaserfan
Ringer Posted July 23, 2011 Posted July 23, 2011 I don't think it's an issue of making a distinct human/other animal species. I don't even think that would be realistically possible with the genetics of it (There's a reason we can't have kids with horses). The issue, as Brainteaserfan said, is probably mostly religious. People thinking that people aren't part of the animal kingdom and putting DNA, cell, or an embryo from a human into an animal would be an abomination to those types; regardless of the good it could do for medical research.
Genecks Posted July 27, 2011 Posted July 27, 2011 (edited) I think human-animal hybrids for research are a great idea. Gene homology exists between animals for coding similar structures with similar functions. However, the gene code may not be the same. But if you replace the animal code with human code, you've (hopefully) made the animal more like a human for research. Now, the downfall is if things don't interact the same way during development and homeostasis. If that occurs, hopefully it can be pinpointed and improved upon. I have a feeling that the downfalls would be difficult to pinpoint due to lacking scientific knowledge. I suspect there would have to be ground-up gene replacements where we know very, very well what a gene does and the cytological interactions. From there, tinkering can continue to make an animal model more like a human. I'm not sure of current research, but it would be great if we could make, say, a pig heart more like a human heart for xenotransplantation. It might be more practical to work on that than actually build a biologically active artificial heart. Perhaps a hybrid of the methods might advance things even further. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/jan/03/qanda.simonjeffery http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenotransplantation Edited July 27, 2011 by Genecks
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