Transcript Designer Babies

Designer Babies
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CREATING NEW WORLD USING
BIOTECHNOLOGY
Designer Babies
Pictures
Designer baby
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The colloquial term "designer baby"
refers to a baby whose genetic makeup
has been artificially selected by genetic
engineering combined with in vitro
fertilisation to ensure the presence or
absence of particular genes or
characteristics. The term is derived by
comparison with "designer clothing".
Designer baby

Designer babies Since the discovery of
DNA in the late 1950's, the possibility of
genetic modification of animals and plants
has become a reality. The term designer
baby refers to the genetic modification of
the child in it's early fetal life. The world
of genetic modification has long moved on
from the days of Dolly the Sheep.
DESIGNER BABIES
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parents will be able to
select or design
desired traits for their
children. Boy or girl?
Blond or brunette?
Blue eyes or brown?
DESIGNER BABY
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moms and dads pick
whether junior has
blue or brown eyes or
black or blond hair.
some known genetic
markers do correlate
with a probability of
hair, eye and skin
color,
DESIGNER BABY
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"Our goal in offering
(embryo screening) to
couples at risk is to
increase the likelihood
that they can achieve
their dream of having
a healthy baby, free
from a catastrophic
genetic disease
Outside =Blue Eyes
Inside = blue eye gene
Outside = Brown Eyes
Inside = brown eye gene
blue eye gene
blue eye gene
They can have kids with either
BROWN EYES
or
BLUE EYES
Inherited Genetic Disorders
Tay-Sachs disease
 Sickle-cell anemia
 Cystic fibrosis
 Hemophilia
 Huntington’s Disease
 Down’s Syndrome

Your choice of babies
Artificial Reproductive Technology
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In vitro fertilisation
– Louise Brown 25 July 1978
Features
Embryo implantation
Embryos can be selected preimplantation
ve
Technology
What should we test for?
Genetic disorders
700 inherited conditions
344 test clinically available
211 prenatal tests offered
 Traits
 Gender

 Embryo
Selection is a relatively simple
process. An ovarian biopsy can yield
many eggs which can be fertilized in vitro
with the partner’s sperm. The cells can be
grown in culture, and at the eight cell
stage, one of the cells can be removed for
diagnosis.
 How
is it done?
 The
removal of one cell allows DNA tests to
be performed on the embryo. The embryo
with the desired trait can then be selected.
 The
final step is implanting the embryo into
the uterus, and letting the pregnancy
continue to term.
 This
process is called in vitro fertilization.
Invitro Fertilization (IVF)
&
Pre-Implantation Genetic
Diagnosis (PGD)
What is IVF?
Use of artificial techniques to join an ovum with
sperm outside (in vitro) woman's body to help
infertile couples to have a children of their own.
The basic technique of IVF involves removing
ova from a woman's ovaries, fertilising them in
the laboratory, and then inserting them into her
uterus.
The first ‘test-tube baby’, Mary Louise Brown,
was born in England in 1978.
Process of IVF
Hyper ovulation
2. Egg Retrieval
3. Artificial Insemination
4. Embryo Transfer
1.

The embryos with faulty genes are
discarded and only healthy ones are
implanted in the mother's womb. The
technique involves fertilizing eggs in a
laboratory. When the embryos are three
days old, scientists take out a cell from it
and analyze it. If they find that the cell
has an abnormal chromosome, the
embryo is discarded as it will lead to
babies with genetic defects
Viable and Desirable?
“This information is
helping parents
choose which
embryos they want-and which to reject as
unhealthy, or merely
undesirable.”
Pre-implantation Genetic
Testing
in vitro fertilization (IVF)
 Allow fertilized cells to divide until 8 cells –
3 days
 Remove single cell for diagnosis within 15
hours
 Decide whether or not to implant

Factual
IVF
*increase in multiple births
*infertile couples can reproduce
*surrogate parenthood
(womb donors, $28K-$45K)
PGD
*decreased rate of specific
diseases in the population
(refer to next slide)
*decreased rate of miscarriage
What is PGD?

Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis. A
procedure to analyze the genetic makeup
of an embryo before it is implanted. The
purpose is to identify disorders and
genetically inherited diseases (Downs
Syndrome, hemophilia, etc) as well as
identify the gender.
Why Should I have PGD done?
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Some of the most common reasons for having the PGD
procedure are:
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Three or more miscarriages in early pregnancy
More than two unsuccessful IVF treatments
Family Balancing
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– If scientists are aware of the sex of an embryo while it remains
still in their care, measures can be taken to assure that only
embryos of a selected gender are returned to the womb for the
possible establishment of pregnancy. While in vitro fertilization
with PGD is only one of the methods for sex predetermination
offered by our Center, it is the only procedure where success
rates are higher than 99.9%.
preimplantation genetic
diagnosis
PGD also known as embryo screening refers to
procedures that are performed on embryos prior
to implantation, sometimes even on oocytes
prior to fertilization.
PGD is considered another way to prenatal
diagnosis.
Its main advantage is that it avoids selective
pregnancy termination as the method makes it
highly likely that the baby will be free of the
disease under consideration.
PGD
In the first group PGD is used to look for a
specific disorder in couples with a high risk
of transmitting an inherited condition.
 This can be a monogenic disorder,
meaning the condition is due to a single
gene only, (autosomal recessive,
autosomal dominant or X-linked disorders)
or a chromosomal structural aberration
(such as a balanced translocation).

PGD

PGD helps these couples identify embryos
carrying a genetic disease or a
chromosome abnormality, thus avoiding
the difficult choice of abortion. In addition,
there are infertile couples who carry an
inherited condition and who opt for PGD
as it can be easily combined with their IVF
treatment
To avoid this
To be tested and prevented as
well
Deafness, Shortness in height, learning
disabilities?
 Gender
 “Gay Gene

Specific disorders
PGD is available for a large number of
monogenic disorders. The most frequently
diagnosed autosomal recessive disorders are
cystic fibrosis, Beta-thalassemia, sickle cell
disease and spinal muscular atrophy type 1.
 The most common dominant diseases are
myotonic dystrophy, Huntington's disease and
Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease; and in the case of
the X-linked diseases, most of the cycles are
performed for fragile X syndrome, haemophilia A
and Duchenne muscular dystrophy.
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Embryo Screening with PGD
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Recent advances in the fields of genetics,
genetic diagnosis, embryo biopsy and
preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD)
have opened up a new world of
opportunity for couples interested in
achieving a healthy pregnancy.
Genetic testing performed prior to embryo
transfer
Biotechnology Issues
1. In Vitro Fertilisation (ART)
2. Human Cloning
3. Therapeutic Tissue Cloning
(Stem Cells)
4. Preimplantation Diagnosis
5. Sex Selection
6. Designer babies
Genetic testing for disease
1. Sample Cells from human
 2.DNA extracted from the Cells
 3.DNA Cut Into Double Stranded
Fragments
 4.Gel Electrophoresis of DNA Fragments
 5.Shorter DNA Pieces have Travelled
Further through Gel than Longer Ones

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The birth of the first British baby
genetically screened before conception to
be free of a breast cancer gene of creating
so-called designer babies
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In the future, the ability to identify many
more genes for different neurological,
psychiatric, and behavioral traits and
disorders before uterine implantation
may present opportunities for parents to
"design" their children, selecting in or
out the desired physical, intellectual, and
temperament traits they desire.
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selecting the child's genetic make-up based on parental
preferences is the right decision.
It is possible that the world into which these designed
children grow changes its values, leaving these
genetically-designed children at a new disadvantage.
Parents who have a socially undesirable trait, like
deafness, may choose to reify their own existence by not
sparing their children this trait, or even selecting for it,
but the children may grow to resent their parents for it,
wanting to be more like the norm.
Other children may be "designed" to be genetically
similar at the HLA locus to a sibling with a condition that
can be "cured" with a bone marrow transplant..
HLA Tissue Typing
Saviour Siblings
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Zain Hashmi
Beta thalassaemia
HLA Tissue Typing
Saviour Siblings
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Molly and Adam Nash
Fanconi Anaemia
HLA Tissue Typing
Saviour Siblings
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Charlie Whitaker
Diamond Blackfan Anaemia
First "designer baby" born free
of breast cancer genetic risk
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‘BRCA1-free’ birth to
designer babies”
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Her parents had undergone a form of in
vitro fertilisation (IVF), which meant that,
unlike the father’s family, the baby was
free of a breast cancer-causing mutation
that had plagued the women of his family
for generations
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Every woman across three generations of
the father’s family had previously been
diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer,
many in their 20s. Tests had shown that
the family carried a faulty copy of the
BRCA1 ‘high-risk’ breast cancer gene.
Although BRCA1 mutations are rare in the
population as a whole, between five and eight
out of ten carriers of this gene fault will go on to
develop breast cancer, often at a young age
(compared to an overall risk of one-in-nine of
the general population). And, as is often the
case with early-onset breast cancer, BRCA1
tumours will often be extremely aggressive.
 So the couple took the decision to use the latest
technology to ensure that their baby didn’t carry
the BRCA1 fault

Beating eye cancer

Retinoblastoma accounts for 11 per cent
of all cancers that develop in the first year
of life. In almost half of cases, it is caused
by an inherited mutation in a gene called
RB1. Parents with this defective gene have
a 50 per cent chance of passing it on to a
child, and it causes tumours in 90 per cent
of those who inherit it. The mutation also
raises the lifetime risk of suffering other
cancers from a third to more than half

The eye cancer retinoblastoma, seen
above in a young boy, affects about 1 in
15,000 children. About half the cases are
hereditary, and those who inherit the
defective gene have a 90 per cent chance
of developing cancer. Up to 95 per cent of
tumours detected early can be treated,
but this requires chemotherapy and
surgery that can cause blindness.
Arguments for creating
designer babies
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Some couples are not able to have children because their children
will have a genetic disease and die before they are born or when
they are very young. Techniques used to change the genetic makeup of the embryo allow these parents to have a child.
If we want the best for our children why shouldn't we design our
own babies? Using genetic techniques we can help prevent certain
genetic diseases. This both saves the children from suffering and
reduces the cost and emotional strain of looking after an ill child.
In a few cases where parents have had one child with a serious
blood disease, they have used IVF to select embryos so that they
can have a second child that can act as a future, tailor-made blood
or bone marrow donor.
In these cases when the child is born he or she will be healthy and
can help their older brother or sister stay well
Arguments against creating
designer babies

In these cases, parents and doctors are creating a child to act as
an organ-donating factory. The child may feel that they were only
born to be a help to their older brother or sister. Children should be
loved and cherished for themselves and not what they can do for
others.

These genetic techniques are very expensive. Why should only rich
people be able to eradicate genetic diseases? This could lead to
imbalances between rich and poor people.

We could get carried away 'correcting' perfectly healthy babies.
Once we start to eliminate embryos because they have the gene for
a disease, what is to stop us from picking babies for their physical
or psychological traits
References
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^ Designer Babies: Ethical Considerations - Nicholas Agar - An
ActionBioscience.org original article
^ McGee, Glenn (2000). The Perfect Baby: A Pragmatic Approach
to Genetics. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 0-8476-8344-3.
^ Appel, J Mandatory Genetic Testing March 4, 2009.
^ Silver, Lee M. (1998). Remaking Eden: Cloning and Beyond in a
Brave New World. Harper Perennial. ISBN 0-380-79243-5.
^ a b Stock, Gregory (2002). Redesigning Humans. Mariner
Books. ISBN 0-618-34083-1.
^ Hughes, James (2004). Citizen Cyborg: Why Democratic
Societies Must Respond to the Redesigned Human of the Future.
Westview Press. ISBN 0-8133-4198-1.
References
^ Edwards RG, Gardner RL (May 1967).
"Sexing of live rabbit blastocysts". Nature
214 (5088): 576–7.
 ^ Handyside AH, Lesko JG, Tarín JJ,
Winston RM, Hughes MR (Sep 1992).
"Birth of a normal girl after in vitro
fertilization and preimplantation diagnostic
testing for cystic fibrosis".
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