First human trials of designer protein therapies stun US neuroscientists
Chinese researchers are testing DREADDs, a gene therapy that can dial down neuronal activity, in at least seven clinical trials for conditions like intractable epilepsy, Parkinson's disease, and neuropathic pain. The news stunned US neuroscientists at a recent NIH BRAIN Initiative meeting, as the technology—developed 20 years ago by Bryan Roth—has never before reached the clinic. If successful, these trials could pave the way for circuit-based treatments for a wide range of neuropsychiatric diseases.
“If that trial is successful, then it opens the way basically to circuit-based therapeutics for virtually all neuropsychiatric diseases,” he says.
- scheme271
Wasn't there just a post a few days ago about how Chinese researchers ignored a bunch of ethical and safety guidelines to run some of this research and ended up killing a girl?
The article just brushes aside that incident and seems to assume that because China is doing this experimentation, it's ahead in regards to gene therapy targeting the brain.
- tiahura
How absurd to think that covid was a gof leak.
- superkuh
This headline is burying the lede. My response to someone using genetically altered retroviruses to genetically engineer cells in the CNS of living humans would be stunned silence too. That's quite a risk to get past a review board.
The big question seems to be, how specific is the targeting of these designer retroviruses to the desired cell types and tissues and how is that achieved?
- mjevans
For all the theories about how covid might have been some conspiracy in China... (I'm more inclined to believe a hybrid, they didn't have a program to develop any weapons out of it, but would EASILY buy a coverup to try to hide the shame of yet another seasonal virus that turned out to be more)
What if this sort of research leads to some prion like disease that either works like a slow acting (fast to spread) neuro-toxin, or a scenario like the Children of Men movie?
Containment and risks need to be considered.
- bix6
Really tired of hearing how much better China is than us. It’s just so demoralizing like what is going on…