CRISPR co-inventor Jennifer Doudna talks ethics and biological frontiers
CRISPR gene-editing technology co-inventor Jennifer Doudna addressed the opportunities and challenges of editing genomes in a Thursday conversation with political science and ethics professor Rob Reich and genetics professor Kelly Ormond.
“The major bottleneck for moving forward in the clinic is delivery,” Doudna said. “In other words, how do we safely introduce the machinery necessary for genetic engineering?”
Since former Stanford postdoctoral fellow He Jiankui announced that he had created the world’s first gene-edited babies using CRISPR-Cas9, the ethical implications of using biomedical technology to conduct gene-editing experiments has been a topic of international controversy.
As part of the Arrow Lecture Series on Ethics and Leadership, Thursday’s talk emphasized the wide-ranging implications of CRISPR and the importance of responsibly testing and deploying gene-editing technologies.
