Are We Ready for Designer Babies?
Popular Science|March - April 2016
Claire Maldarelli
Are We Ready for Designer Babies?

When Chinese researchers reported using a technique called CRISPR/Cas9 to edit the genome of human embryos this past April, they sparked a worldwide debate over how this technology could (or should) be used. Scientists expressed legitimate fears: What are the side effects? Will this open the floodgates to designer humans? The world’s foremost geneticists, biotechnologists, and bioethicists gathered in Washington, D.C., in December to address those questions and map the future of human-gene editing. 

CRISPR isn’t the first genome-editing tool, but it is by far the best. 

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