Emmanuelle Charpentier & Jennifer Doudna should be household names by now and here is why!I
These two women have collaboratively arrived at a very accurate and repeatable method of genome editing which has huge ramifications for human health, longevity and the very nature of our species going forward. We are now at a point where the human genome can be edited like a piece of text in Microsoft word. Specific genes can be targeted and replaced, deleted or changed with crispr- Cas9 , reliably and repeatably. crispr-Cas9 can theoretically be used to reset the teleomeres of an individual to achieve indefinite lifespan. Who will win? who will lose? who wants to live forever?
Considering telomeres: I guess we should first cure cancer before we make all our cells able to multiply indefinitely ;)
Nontheless, CRISPR-Cas9 will have a huge impact. The first gene editing experiments in human are waiting to be approved, and in the food industry they are ready to launch the first edited crops.
Exciting future..
I am very excited about crispr- Cas9 gene editing and have lots of respect for Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna since I read about them in Wired magazine some time ago. Their work changed the game forever and we're just beginning to see the results that will come from this new gene editing technique.
On life extension and rejuvenation, some companies are working on this, such as http://www.biovivemd.com/ and http://www.calicolabs.com/
The later is an Alphabet (Google) company and is short for California Life Company. With the resources of Google behind it, I think we all stand a chance for a healthier and possibly very long future!
This is the single most significant discovery in human medicine by a huge margin. The ramifications are widespread. The worlds elite already have labs set up and are treating themselves with vectored genomes. Someone alive now will live hundreds of years. What of the rest of us?
Thanks for commenting on this post. I truly believe we are on the verge of Ray Kurzweills "singularity". He would be one of the main people behind googles efforts. Meanwhile no one pays attention or just to jaded to understand where we, as a species, are perched, so precariously.