Crispr-Cas9

"Dino....droppings?"

Amy Maxman writes

Using the three-year-old technique [called Crisper-Cas9], researchers have already reversed mutations that cause blindness, stopped cancer cells from multiplying, and made cells impervious to the virus that causes AIDS.

My reaction:

The scientific ideas behind this Crispr-Cas9 technique are deep and elegant, exploiting defense features developed by our ancient bacterial ancestors. 

An easy prediction: the regulatory and ethical battles over this technology will be emotional and poorly informed. Lousy comparisons will be made to our success in keeping the nuclear genie in the bottle for 70 years. 

In the end though, barriers to entry may simply be too low to stop "recreational" or unethical uses of Crispr, and things may devolve into an unfortunate "War on Drugs"-type scenario.