Question: CRISPR has become a more and more reliable technique to edit genes and is, in theory, able to make the body resistant to most, if not all pathogens. Considering a not so distant future, to what extent do you belive this may be achieved? Could this method replace the need of any antibiotic/antifungal/antiviral? If it can truly edit our genes, can it make the cancerous cells stop dividing by altering those specific genes and program the cancerous cells's death? What are your concerns about CRISPR? Do you support it?

Juan Ortiz answered on 14 Jun 2016:

Hey VictorDobos,

First of all congratulations for such an interesting question. I can see you have potential to become a future scientist.

I have used the CRISPR/CAS9 method to edit the gene of humans cells to make experiments with them. This technique is very revolutionary and makes very easy to modify genes in eukaryotic cells. However, my experiments were focused in cells growing in plate in the laboratory and it still took me two months to get what I wanted. Not all the cells get the DNA that you want them to take and it is required to separated those that got the DNA from those who didn’t. This is something that can be done with cells in the lab, but obviously not with cells in the human body.
I am sure in the near future would be possible to extract cells from the bone marrow of a patient, modify them with CRISP/CAS9 and then reintroduce them into the patient. And this can be probably used to strengthen the immune system of the patient to fight a cancer for example. There are also methods to introduce DNA into the cells in the body of a patient, but this is technically more difficult.

I think that targeting cancer cells with the CRISPR/CAS9 to drive them into cell’s death is possible. However, I think with several treatments of the appropriate DNA the cancer cells may be destroyed. The problem would be to address this attack only to the cancer cells and not to the healthy cells. The cancers very often are not localised in a spot but expand and send cancerous cells into the blood stream. So this would be the weak point of the CRISPR/CAS9. Because it would be necessary to design a system to deliver the DNA into the cell for every type of cancer and there are a lot!

I find more unlikely to be capable of become resistant to all the infectious diseases. Why? For the simple reason that microbes mutate very fast and become resistant to treatments so the diseases is always ahead of the cure. I believe antibiotics/antivirals/antifungals won’t be replaced by this method.
I think the concerns I have are about the unexpected health issues derivate from the genetic modification of a human. The treatment can end up being worse than the cure, because genes interact with each other within the cell and a multi cellular organism is very complex. I support the CRISP/CAS9 method myself, because I think any technical or scientific progress can potentially improve our lives if used with responsibility.

I found this interesting/fun video that explains the system in plain words if you want to know more.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2016/01/26/crispr-gene-editing-technology.aspx