In 2018, a scientist in China named He Jiankui shocked the world while he alleged responsibility for the births of the first two genetically modified infants, has been convicted to three years in jail, according to the reports on Monday.
The court also convicted two of He’s co-workers to time in jail, resolving that the three infringed Chinese regulations, utilized medicine without a license, and crossed a moral line by using the Crispr gene-editing technology on the fetus to make them resistant to HIV. According to a source, He was also penalized $430,000.
What is Crispr?
The Crispr is a simple process of squeezing DNA that came to light around 2012. The gene-editing technology CRISPR-Cas9 earned Science magazine’s Discovery of the Year Award in 2015, beating out progress like the Pluto flyby.
A source revealed that the court filing showed that a third genetically altered baby had been born, in addition to the first two, twins nicknamed Nana and Lulu.
His work was the first to practice CRISPR technology to manage a gene linked with HIV in fetuses. It drew gigantic abuse from the scientific community around the world, with scientists describing his work wrong and vulnerable.
The reason why scientists did not accept he’s work
The discussion about the potential of CRISPR took an unexpected turn in 2018 while he alleged that the first two genetically altered infants had been born.
Away gene edits for safeguard against HIV which can itself produce effects for infants later on — the scientific association has long been troubled with whether genetic alteration could lead to “designer infants” managed to have some features like preferred hair color or superior knowledge.