Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
line. I should add a caveat: in my view, it is probably too early to know
what the relative contributions to human health will be of gene transfer,
cell transplantation (including human embryonic stem cell transplanta-
tion), and drugs. A recent article suggests that a combination of factors
may be involved.
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The Brain
In this arena, one can imagine that the brain, which has until now been
off-limits except in efforts to treat diseases like glioma, will become a
legitimate target for gene transfer research. A foretaste of things to come
could be a recent gene transfer study that attempted to introduce
the dopamine D2 receptor into rats, in an effort to decrease alcohol
consumption.
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Enhancement
An obvious physical enhancement that also would be disease related
would be a fine-tuning of the human immune system, so that it is much
less likely to go awry either in attacking an individual's own body in the
event of autoimmune diseases or in overreacting to environmental aller-
gens. A candidate for intellectual enhancement would be the preserva-
tion of memory during the process of aging, in contrast to the dementia
that afflicts so many elderly people. Important theoretical questions with
regard to enhancement will be, What is enhancement? What is remedi-
ation of an undesirable condition? And can we draw a clear line between
these two categories?
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Germ Line Intervention
To many people, the final and most forbidding frontier in genetics may
seem to be deliberately attempting to transmit particular genes to our
children and grandchildren. This may be a case in which incremental
steps will lead to a point where each major industrial society will need
to pause and consider what it wants its future policy on human germ
line intervention to be. Here are several foreseeable steps that could be
leading us toward this decision point:
•
Germ line changes as unintended side effects of somatic cell gene
transfer.
•
Nuclear transfer in human eggs, to prevent mitochondrial disease.
