ARTs
Assisted reproductive technologies are designed to help infertile people or couples with difficulties conceiving a child to successfully initiate the pregnancy process. For example, one of the basic approaches is to use a donor egg or donor sperm cell, depending on which person has abnormal reproductive cells, and insert the nucleus of the interested couples within these cells. This is followed up by in vitro fertilization, which means it is done outside the human body, and implanted back to a female (“Preparing for ART,” 2019). The use of ART for the treatment of infertility today is prevalent, but the attitude towards the use of assistive technologies among the population is not unambiguous.
On the one hand, this is an opportunity to become parents for infertile couples, on the other hand, the ART industry acts as a new type of business and, therefore, we can talk about the commercialization of parenthood and, accordingly, the problem of financial affordability. The success and failure rates are manifested in the fact that out of 150000 ART procedures, only 35% result in successful pregnancies, where 29% result in the normal birth of a baby (“Preparing for ART,” 2019).
In addition, religious and ethnic factors influence attitudes towards assistive technology use. In the context of the demographic crisis, the possibility of solving the problem of infertility with the help of assistive technologies becomes even more urgent, which makes the study of public opinion about assisted reproductive technologies in society, especially youth, problematic.
Advances in medicine have given parenthood happiness to many partners and single women. However, discussions about the admissibility of human intervention in the sacrament of conception still do not stop. Traditional denominations prohibit or restrict the use of assisted reproductive technologies, considering them an attempt by a person to compete with God in the ability to create the miracle of a new life. The Catholic Church is known for its categorical position on this issue, since almost all assisted reproductive technologies are rejected, while other world religions are more sensitive to the topic, where often priests bless in vitro fertilization, provided that the patients are married and donor material is not used for fertilization. In addition to problems of a religious nature, experts around the world regularly raise the issue of ethics for the use of embryos.
Cancer
Cancer is caused by a multitude of factors, such as genetic, environmental, and infectious, which results in abnormal growth and division rate of cancerous cells. Regardless of the type of factor triggering cancer, it is manifested in the genetic change of two forms of genes, such as tumor-suppressing genes or oncogenes. Tumor-suppressing genes, at a normal state, usually suppress the cell division process and act as a checkpoint for the cell’s lifecycle. The loss of such a gene can result in a cell losing the control mechanism for its division process, which results in cancer.
Normally, oncogenes are the genes, which induce the cell division process to regenerate or create new cells, but mutations that make them constantly active or overexpressed leads to abnormal cell division and cancer. These mutational changes can be triggered or accelerated by environmental factors, such as smoking. The chemicals within the smoke act as potent mutagens, which enhance the formation of mutations in cells and increase the likelihood of lung cancer by a significant margin.
Some forms of cancer can be genetically predisposed, such as breast cancer. It can be pre-diagnosed through genetic testing and analysis to take preliminary measures. It is stated that hepatitis C is an example of liver cancer caused by a virus (Hayes, 2018). Thus, infectious diseases can also trigger cancerous cells, which is the result of viral activity. The virus can be considered as mutagen itself because some types of them insert their genes into a host’s genome.
Gene Editing
The international pause on clinical trials of CRISPR/Cas9 technology is because it can be used for human design and embryonic changes, which always leads to ethical concerns. It is stated that the given technology can deliberately change one’s genome by introducing positive or desirable traits, such as taller height, a certain eye color, stronger bones, and a lower risk for cardiovascular diseases (Doudna, 2015).
I believe that there is a need for precise regulatory limitations for the use of Crispr/Cas9 to avoid potential implications, starting from horrendous human designs to biological inequality achieved by children whose parents can afford such procedures. In addition, I can already imagine how the commercialization process can push aggressive advertising playing on one’s physical insecurities and become more invasive and controversial than the plastic surgery industry.
CRISPR/Cas9 is simply a bacterial defense mechanism against viruses and their genetic material. The Cas9 protein uses a complementary RNA derived from viral DNA to find the viral insertion and degrade it (Doudna, 2015). This is critical because the technology can be programmed to cut out any sequence of DNA, and it is highly precise. In addition, double-strand breaks caused by these cuts are easily repaired in human cells due to the presence of double-strand break repair mechanisms, such as non-homologous end-joining and homologous repair.
There are other technologies for genome editing, such as zinc-finger nucleases (ZFN) and transcription activator-like effector nucleases (TALEN) (Ain, Chung, & Kim, 2015). Both of them find the specific locus in the genome and, with the help of Fok1, can cut out the sequence. However, the overall simplicity of Crispr/Cas9 technology makes it more efficient and feasible to use.
Xenotransplantation
An organ transplant between different species is called xenotransplantation. In medicine, this term refers to the transplantation of organs and tissues from an animal to a person. The problem of organ deficiency, as well as several other problems in the development of transplantation, could be solved by developing a new area of organ transplantation from animals (Yang, 2018). Xenotransplantation refers to any procedure that involves transplanting, implanting, or infusing into the recipient’s body either living cells, tissues or organs derived from a different species, or fluids, cells, tissues or organs of the body of the same species as the recipient, but having ex vivo contact with living animal cells, tissues or organs of another species.
Fetal neurons or stem cells, porcine pancreatic cells, encapsulated chromaffin cells of bovine adrenal glands, primate bone marrow, and extracorporeal devices using the whole organ or its cells also fall into this category. Biological preparations or materials obtained from animals but not containing living cells, such as pork heart valves or porcine insulin, are not considered xenograft products and do not fit this definition. The success is manifested in the fact that many patients can acquire an organ without risking their lives waiting in line. The risks can be associated with tissue rejection because xenotransplantation involves intergrading foreign tissue within one’s body.
References
Ain, Q. U., Chung, J. Y., & Kim, Y. H. (2015). Current and future delivery systems for engineered nucleases: ZFN, TALEN and RGEN. Journal of Controlled Release, 205, 120-127.
Doudna, J. (2015). How CRISPR lets us edit our DNA?TED. Web.
Hayes, N. (2018). Are you part of the silent epidemic? Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Web.
Preparing for ART. (2019). Web.
Yang, L. (2018). How to create a world where no one dies waiting for a transplant?TED. Web.