De-extinction puzzle: how decoding numbat DNA could help resurrect the Tasmanian tiger; The Guardian, February 18, 2022

Donna Lu, The Guardian; De-extinction puzzle: how decoding numbat DNA could help resurrect the Tasmanian tiger

"“There are those people who would argue that this is playing God … I don’t buy that,” he says. “This is about playing smart human to redress the times when we inappropriately played God by exterminating things.”"

The ethics of gene editing: Lulu, Nana, and 'Gattaca; Johns Hopkins University, January 17, 2019

Saralyn Cruickshank, Johns Hopkins University; The ethics of gene editing: Lulu, Nana, and 'Gattaca

"Under the direction of Rebecca Wilbanks, a postdoctoral fellow in the Berman Institute of Bioethics and the Department of the History of Medicine, the students have been immersing themselves during in the language and principles of bioethics and applying what they learn to their understanding of technology, with an emphasis on robotics and reproductive technology in particular.

To help them access such heady material, Wilbanks put a spin on the course format. For the Intersession class—titled Science Fiction and the Ethics of Technology: Sex, Robots, and Doing the Right Thing—students explore course materials through the lens of science fiction.

"We sometimes think future technology might challenge our ethical sensibilities, but science fiction is good at exploring how ethics is connected to a certain way of life that happens to include technology," says Wilbanks, who is writing a book on how science fiction influenced the development of emerging forms of synthetic biology. "As our way of life changes together with technology, so might our ethical norms.""

Stanford's Final Exams Pose Question About the ethics of Genetic Engineering; Futurism, July 9, 2017

Tom Ward, Futurism; Stanford's Final Exams Pose Question About the ethics of Genetic Engineering

"When bioengineering students sit down to take their final exams for Stanford University, they are faced with a moral dilemma, as well as a series of grueling technical questions that are designed to sort the intellectual wheat from the less competent chaff:

If you and your future partner are planning to have kids, would you start saving money for college tuition, or for printing the genome of your offspring?

The question is a follow up to “At what point will the cost of printing DNA to create a human equal the cost of teaching a student in Stanford?” Both questions refer to the very real possibility that it may soon be in the realm of affordability to print off whatever stretch of DNA you so desire, using genetic sequencing and a machine capable of synthesizing the four building blocks of DNA — A, C, G, and T — into whatever order you desire...

It is vital to discuss the ethics of gene editing in order to ensure that the technology is not abused in the future. Stanford’s question is praiseworthy because it makes today’s students, who will most likely be spearheading the technology’s developments, think about the consequences of their work."

CRISPR will be a huge story in 2017. Here are 7 things to look for.; Vox, 1/3/17

Eliza Barclay and Brad Plumer, Vox; CRISPR will be a huge story in 2017. Here are 7 things to look for.

"We’re about to enter a golden age of genetic engineering, where huge advances in gene-editing technology are making it possible for scientists to tweak the DNA of different organisms with incredible, unprecedented precision.

Until just a few years ago, altering individual genes in everything from plant cells to mouse cells to human cells was a crude, laborious, and often futile process.

Now scientists have developed a technology called CRISPR/Cas9 (or CRISPR for short), which harnesses the immune system of bacteria to snip individual genes, either knocking them out or even inserting new ones in their place. (Here’s our full explainer on CRISPR, which is different from conventional genetic modification techniques.)

What’s impressive about CRISPR is how it’s transforming the work of so many scientists in so many different fields. Much of the important work is still in the proof-of-concept stage — for example, proving that you can use CRISPR to control transcription (making an RNA copy of a gene sequence), edit the epigenome, or image the genome in living cells. But as the details get worked out, scientists say they can imagine CRISPR becoming an incredibly powerful tool."

Breaking Taboo, Swedish Scientist Seeks To Edit DNA Of Healthy Human Embryos; NPR, 9/22/16

Rob Stein, NPR; Breaking Taboo, Swedish Scientist Seeks To Edit DNA Of Healthy Human Embryos:

"A scientist in Sweden has started trying to edit the DNA in healthy human embryos, NPR has learned.

The step by the developmental biologist Fredrik Lanner makes him the first researcher known to attempt to modify the genes of healthy human embryos. That has long been considered taboo because of safety and ethical concerns.

Lanner is attempting to edit genes in human embryos to learn more about how the genes regulate early embryonic development. He hopes the work could lead to new ways to treat infertility and prevent miscarriages. He also hopes to help scientists learn more about embryonic stem cells so they can someday use them to treat many diseases.

The fear is that Lanner's work could open the door to others attempting to use genetically modified embryos to make babies."