Sources of Essential Oils
K. Hüsnü Can Başer, Gerhard Buchbauer in Handbook of Essential Oils, 2020
Genetic engineering is defined as the direct manipulation of the genes of organisms by laboratory techniques, not to be confused with the indirect manipulation of genes in traditional (plant) breeding. Transgenic or GMOs are organisms (bacteria, plants, etc.) that have been engineered with single or multiple genes (either from the same species or from a different species), using contemporary molecular biology techniques. These are organisms with improved characteristics, in plants, for example, with resistance or tolerance to biotic or abiotic stresses such as insects, disease, drought, salinity, and temperature. Another important goal in improving agricultural production conditions is to facilitate weed control by transformed plant resistant to broadband herbicides like glufosinate. Peppermint has been successfully transformed with the introduction of the bar gene, which encodes phosphinothricin acetyltransferase, an enzyme inactivating glufosinate ammonium or the ammonium salt of glufosinate, phosphinothricin, making the plant insensitive to the systemic, broadspectrum herbicide Roundup (Roundup Ready mint) (Li et al., 2001).
The Role of Biomedical Technology
Kant Patel, Mark Rushefsky in Healthcare Politics and Policy in America, 2019
At present, there is almost no federal regulation of ARTs in the United States. Federal regulatory agencies have also not played any meaningful role in the regulation of reproductive technologies largely because their jurisdictions about what they can do have been limited by Congressional laws. The National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee, which has the expertise in this area, is limited in its jurisdiction by the fact that in 1996 Congress passed the Dickey-Wicker Amendment prohibiting the NIH from using federal funds to create human embryos for research or conducting research in which human embryos are destroyed or knowingly subjected to risk, injury, or death. The Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) main focus is on safety regulations, not research. The FDA is responsible for the oversight and regulation of human genetic engineering and regulation of the safety of biologics (gene therapy products or tissue) and medical devices. Thus, technically, regulation of reproductive technologies could fall under its purview, but ARTs are not quite biologics, nor medical devices. Also, the FDA role is to regulate safety and not the moral or legal legitimacy of such technologies. Thus, at the federal level, there is no body or institution that has a clear authority to regulate the development and use of many of the reproductive technologies (Ossareh 2017).
Nucleic Acids
Danilo D. Lasic in LIPOSOMES in GENE DELIVERY, 2019
Genetic engineering is a technology for constructing novel genetic elements from pieces of naturally occurring genes and regulatory sequences. These are then inserted into cells (bacteria, yeast, insect, plant, and mammalian cells) and various organisms produce molecules whose codes were inserted into them. By far the most frequently used are bacteria, especially E. coli. This technology allows production of relatively large amounts of engineered proteins, including various therapeutic proteins, cytokines (granulocyte macrophage-colony-stimulating factor, interleukins, interferons, etc.), various growth factors, and others. Additionaly, genetically engineered microbes, plants, and animals can do many other beneficial tasks, as will be briefly described below. Also, methods of recombinant DNA technology have a potential to revolutionize human identification and offer invaluable, but unfortunately not yet appreciated, evidence in various criminal proceedings. In another example, the remnants of Czar Nicholas II and his family can finally rest in peace because of DNA analysis. Another application which caught general interest is recovery of old DNA from fossils. After initial optimism and some successful extractions and sequence determinations, it seems now that really old DNA can be preserved only in amber-embedded insects and that some other results were simply contaminants (Service, 1996).
Neurological adverse effects of chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy
Published in Expert Review of Clinical Immunology, 2023
Kiarash Saleki, Mohamad Hosein Mohamadi, Parsa Alijanizadeh, Nima Rezaei
CAR T-lymphocyte immunotherapy comprises both CD4+ and CD8+ T cells [7]. To prepare a CAR T-lymphocyte treatment, T-lymphocytes can be obtained from each case’s own blood (autologous) and another healthy individual (allogenic). Notably, the molecular process of genetic engineering is almost the same for both conditions. After isolation from blood, leukocyte apheresis should be carried out and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) should be isolated and retrieved—Leukapheresis is the removal of a subject’s white blood cells (WBCs) from the blood circulation. Following leukocyte apheresis, obtained cells are prepared for additional processing. For cell-processing, T-cells specifically proliferate and are then activated with CD3- and CD28-blocking agents to expand in large numbers [8].
New advances in the treatments of drug-resistant tuberculosis
Published in Expert Review of Anti-infective Therapy, 2023
Mohanad Mahmoud, Yurong Tan
The potential of genetic engineering is almost limitless. Retroviruses and adenoviruses have great transfection efficiency, but their toxicity limits their application. This toxicity activates an immune response and invades the recipient chromosomal DNA with viral DNA. Rather than using genome editing components, non-viral delivery methods are preferred. Nanotechnology has the potential to enhance the safety and efficacy of CRISPR/Cas9 component distribution through the use of specialized polymeric nanoparticles [68]. In recent genetic engineering research, a phage-based delivery strategy for an endogenous III-A CRISPR-Cas system against TB based on infection assay results showed that recombinant phage was no more harmful to M. tuberculosis H37Ra than wild-type phage. The study hypothesized that this was due to ineffectiveness of the CRISPR-Cas III-A in M. tuberculosis H37Ra interfering with nucleic acids. The III-A CRISPR-Cas system in M. tuberculosis H37Ra was unable to efficiently target the invading plasmid, but it significantly reduced the mRNA level of the target genes [69].
The Person-Affecting/Identity-Affecting Distinction between Forms of Human Germline Genome Editing Is Useless in Practical Ethics
Published in The American Journal of Bioethics, 2022
Benjamin Gregg
In another case (Gregg 2021) I show how essentialist understandings of human identity render possible agreement on urgent bioethical issues even more difficult than it would otherwise be. I offer a more plausible basis for agreement: a naturalistic understanding of human nature, construed politically as the self-understanding of the human species in response to the question: To what kind of human nature should we humans aspire? Thoughtful responses to that question might offer perspectives and standards for the regulation of human genetic engineering. Research indicates that social and political views on human nature, when combined with scientific knowledge, can facilitate notions of personal identity useful in analyzing the kinds of regulatory issues raised by CRISPR and other biotechnologies (Strohminger and Nichols 2014).
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