What are the difficulties of implementing the "ultra-safe" antiviral cell program?

On June 2, 2016, scientists led by Jeff Boyko of New York University, George Church of Harvard University and Pharian Isaac, a bioengineer at Yale University, announced in the Journal of Science that they will raise $100 million to launch a 10-year project to create the human genome in a laboratory from scratch.
news, the release of the scientific community and the public on the laboratory "synthetic" out of human seity.
but after two years of uproar and uproar, the project's leadership team announced in Boston on May 1st that it would temporarily abandon its attempt to make the human genome from scratch, focusing on editing cells to combat viral infections.
why do they favour so-called "super-safe" antiviral cells? What are the difficulties in implementing the new plan? Science and the British journal Nature both paid attention to the report on the 1st.
what is "super-safe" cell researchers say the thrust of the latest project is clear: redesigning the genomes of humans and other species to make them "super-safe."
the journal Nature, researchers say "super-safe" cells will benefit in multiple areas.
for example, when drug companies use cells to make therapeutic proteins, if cells are infected with a virus, the entire production must stop, and antiviral human cell lines allow companies to make vaccines, antibodies and other biological drugs without the risk of virus contamination.
, drug-resistant cell lines are also safer and more effective pharmaceutical plants and do not require much monitoring.
, these cells could help scientists create protein drugs that have chemical "adornants" similar to those found in human proteins, reducing the risk of rejection by the body's immune system. More importantly, the new project could help researchers move beyond current editorial tools such as CRISPR to gain broader, better genome redesign tools, said Farin Isaac, executive board member of the Science Council for the human genome writing program at the
.
he envisions that in the future scientists will "rewrite the genome so that organisms have new functions" - such as the ability to reproduce only in a laboratory environment under strict control.
in addition to being able to fight the virus, organizers are also considering other ultra-safe cellular characteristics, such as cancer mutations, radiation, and freezing.
virus protection against the genetic code, how to make cells "poisonnotated"? The researchers explain that protecting cells from viruses requires "recoding", that is, changing the cell's DNA sequence, known as a cryptogenic, which decodes the amino acid composition of proteins.
Because multiple ciphers can represent the same amino acids, researchers can swap out redundant ciphers and retain the important functions of cells.
by eliminating certain ciphers, they can safely remove some of the cellular mechanisms by which these ciphers are translated into proteins.
when viruses "hijack" cells and try to replicate them, they also rely on these cellular mechanisms to decode their genes.
Toston Waldminhos, a chromosomal biologist at the University of Marburg in Germany, was not involved in the genome-writing project.
he said that because the recoding cells "basically speak another language", they cannot "entertain" the virus, which in turn creates resistance to the virus.
the genome needs at least 400,000 changes to human cells to fight the virus, according to a statement released by the human genome writing team.
new projects may require the technology conceived in the lab by the founders and leaders of the Human Genome Writing Project.
2005, Isaac began experimenting with recoding the E. coli genome. In a 2013 paper
Isaac, Qiu Qi and his collaborators exchanged 321 codes in E. coli, making them resistant to certain viruses.
currently, two laboratories are working to remove other codets for E. coli.
the idea of cell recoding, Waldminhos said: "It works in E. coli, and I hope it works in human cells, which is not new scientific insight ... But I still think it's worth it.
"ultra-safe" antiviral cell program to implement the difficulties of the new project ideal is very plump, but the reality is very bone.
still face many challenges in achieving the project.
bear the brunt of the financial problem.
, despite the fact that gene-editing technology companies have offered to contribute their technology at the 1st meeting, people or groups willing to come up with real money are still missing.
, how the project will be implemented is unclear.
Boyko wants to prioritize the recoding of human and mouse genomes.
said that if the new project models the ongoing Yeast Genome Project (Sc2.0), the chosen participating groups will be funded.
the Human Genome Development Project involving some 200 scientists, some of whom have spontaneously formed nine "working groups" to address a wide range of topics, from technology and infrastructure development to the ethical, legal and social impact of the project, and to develop "charters" and "road maps" for future work.
finally, IP issues may also complicate new projects. "In synthetic biology and synthetic genomics, there is usually only partial intellectual property, " says
Boyko.
" Isaac also points out that Harvard, Yale and MIT all have patents related to recoding.
However, there is an intellectual property team in the Human Genome Project Working Group that will explore the technologies used in the program and how possible future breakthroughs can be shared.
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