The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race

Can you imagine the ability to re-engineer your future generations - _blue eyed, stronger, taller, free from any disorders, immortal?!_ Would the distinction between man-made and natural exist in future? Is this "hacking" ethical? Today's discussion centered around these while Anusha presented a captivating book summary of *The Code Breaker* The book deals with three primary themes- 1. Jennifer Doudna tryst with biology and her shift to chemistry 2. Establishing herself as a reputed figure in the field of genetic research and successful collaborations with scientists worldwide 3. Extending her expertise to inform policy-makers on maintaining fine balance between research for medical advancement and its eminent misuse. Doudna received 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for her pioneering work in the field of genome editing - CRISPR. CRISPR allows scientists to modify DNA, the hereditary information in humans and almost all other organisms. Modifying DNA can lead to changes in an organism’s characteristics, such as eye color or susceptibility to disease. It has been successfully used to treat sickel cell diseases. The potential of this technology is endless. Some people are already thinking of CRISPR as a new tool to shape children according to the parent’s preferences - “designer babies” one might call them. That's where the ethical boundaries start blurring and one might start protesting. All in all, though a very technical subject, it evoked several existential questions. _Assume you had the "power", would you choose to alter any aspect of your current self or your future generations?_

Well written, intriguing inside view of how laboratories compete and collaborate for funding, developing patents and making money for companies, institutions and scientists. The book is focused on Jennifer Doudna, awarded the 2020 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for her work developing CRISPR, a relatively simple gene editing technique, with the promise of development of methods of treating diseases, permanently editing for inherited traits (e.g., so-called designer babies as well as traits causing disease or disability), and development of vaccines. The author believes Covid changed the dynamic in the science world where scientists and labs saw the worldwide potential for disaster and found ways to cooperate to meet public need using a collaborative, multi-disciplinary and business style approach (e.g., development of labs and methods for testing for covid, development of mRNA vaccines). He also believes this science is the new tech with exploding possibilities you could see as the tech world took off. There are serious moral and ethical issues around development of gene editing techniques in humans with lines that can be difficult to draw between treatment of disease and heritable features that can impact the diversity in humans, individually desired traits and the good of society, all without a full understanding of all the impacts. There are hackers out there with lab skills who can read the scientific papers and learn to use CRISPR techniques outside the control of government regulation. The use of gene editing to modify children's characteristics are likely to be very expensive and exacerbate income and class disparities and discrimination, and it isn't a big step from this to development of humans for various purposes. Overall this book is a fantastic read and addresses issues which are developing at an eye-popping rapid pace.

Nice!

This book had lots of great information. I’m close to the topic so I found some on the details lacking. Also, the author struggled to make it feel cohesive.