As you may know, I’ve had the great honor of serving as a member of the World Health Organization expert advisory committee on human genome editing, created by WHO Director…
read more Our Best Values Must Guide Our Most Powerful Technologies https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/DNA-sequencing.jpg 279 181 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
Soon after a series of incredible discoveries almost five decades ago launched the era recombinant DNA (later renamed genetically modified organisms, or GMOs), some of the world’s leading scientists and…
read more Has the Third CRISPR Baby Already Been Born? https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/babies.jpg 800 480 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
For years, I have been saying the genetics revolution is not just coming but already here. As we unlock the secrets of our genomes and systems biology more broadly, we…
read more Inviting You to a Genetic Engineering Dinner Party (*) https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/carrot.jpg 284 284 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
I am inviting you to a dinner party – where you are the host. You can invite whomever you’d like: your family, friends, co-workers, book club members, etc. The preparation…
read more Louise Brown at 40! https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/louise-brown1.jpg 284 177 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
Forty years ago today, Louise Brown, the world’s first “test tube baby,” was born in Manchester, England. The idea that a human could be conceived outside the mother’s body is now commonplace but it shook the world back in 1978. read more
Homo Sapiens 2.0? We Need a Species-Wide Conversation on the Future of Human Genetic Enhancement https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/genetic-man.jpg 230 219 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
In my article in TechCrunch, released today, I call for a species-wide conversation on the future of human genetic enhancement. Such a dialogue has never before been carried out. We…
read more Would I Genetically Enhance My Own Children? https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/themes/movedo/images/empty/thumbnail.jpg 150 150 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
When someone at a Los Angeles book event asked me a personal question, I was already disarmed, exposed, and predisposed to a more personal answer. “Would you genetically enhance your own children?” read more
Our Conversation of Genetic Modification must be Evidence-Based https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/themes/movedo/images/empty/thumbnail.jpg 150 150 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
Marcy Darnovsky’s call to arms against “radical biological procedures,” namely mitochondrial transfer from the eggs of a woman with healthy mitochondria to replace the diseased mitochondria of an aspiring mother, in her New York Times editorial today [linked here] goes too far. read more
NY Times story on PGD only the tip of the iceberg! https://jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/themes/movedo/images/empty/thumbnail.jpg 150 150 Jamie Metzl //jamiemetzl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/logo-trans-rev-685px.png
Gina Kolata’s important article in today’s New York Times (linked here) on the ethical questions surrounding preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) and embryo selection only touches the very tip of the genetic iceberg. read more