UK to allow babies from three people

[Cogito]

To those wondering, this does not involve gene splicing or anything like that.

Instead, defective mitochondria are being replaced with mitochondria from a healthy donor. This technique is only valid for diseases involving defective mitochondria.

The mitochondrial DNA is responsible for very very little of the genetic material that defines who a person is, essentially limited to how effective the mitochondria are at their job. This is around 0.1% of the total genetic code.

Mitochondria are organelles in our cells that break down molecules to provide energy for the cell, in the form of ATP. They have their own genetic code completely distinct from the host cell's DNA.

The mitochondria are replaced in either the egg OR in the embryo. In both cases this is done by removing the nucleus (containing the cell's genetic material) from the cell that has defective mitochondria and transferring it to a donor cell with healthy mitochondria. The donor cell's nucleus is completely removed.

The mitochondrial DNA is passed down from the mother alone, whilst the DNA in the embryo is formed from both the mother and father. For this reason mitochondrial DNA has much less genetic diversity. Mitochondria 'reproduce' by binary fission which is similar to bacterial cell division and produces little variation in its genetic code, whilst egg and sperm go through meiosis allowing the genetic code to be mixed.

Opposition seems to be coming from two camps.

- Those who don't like the destruction of the donor embryo (when that method is used),

- Those who think this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans, or so called "designer babies"

[gameshot911]

>Those who think this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans, or so called "designer babies"

Well...this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans.

[tosseraccount]

"This is around 0.1% of the total genetic code."

More like 13% ... check my math ...

Most chromosomes have 2 copies per cell.

However ... there are many copies of the mitochondria : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_mitochondrial_genetics#Qu... <i> Each human cell contains approximately 100 mitochondria, giving a total number of mtDNA molecules per human cell of approximately 500.</i>

Mitochondira make about 15% of then genetic material in a human cell.

total chr1-22+X/Y ~= 6,200,000,000 (6.2 billion, sizeof genome = 3.1B times 2) sizeof one mitochondira : 16569

so ((100)(50016569))/6200000000 = .13362096774193548387

[recibe]

Opposition is also from those who don't think that human reproduction is a moral imperative to be guaranteed by the state - under the fallacy that it somehow increases our collective quality of life.

Like me.

[Crito]

How do mitochondria replicate their own DNA? Do they somehow have the rest of the cell do it, or do they contain/produce and use all of the necessary enzymes/proteins/base-pairs/etc to do it by themselves?

The relationship between them and their host cell almost seems similar to ant-fungus mutualism.

[JacobAldridge]

We (my beautiful wife and I) are currently going through the baby-making limbo, and it looks as though IVF will be the necessary next step. When you start actively trying to have children, there's loads of literature preparing you for the pregnancy swelling and the sleepless life of parenthood etc - less so preparing you for the anxiety, uncertainty, and just general feeling of not being in control of your life which comes from things not working for you.

I couldn't imagine the additional emotional turmoil that would come from repeated miscarriages, terminations etc. I'm really holding myself back from thinking about the ecstasy that a confirmed pregnancy will provide after our time and struggles - to have complications and loss after that would be devastating.

So bravo to the scientists working on this, to the parliament for 'permitting' it, and of course to those struggling wannabe parents having to fight for their family dream.

[mikerichards]

We did IVF and got pregnant on our first try. We now have a beautiful 2 year old boy :)

Good luck.

[michaelsbradley]

I have some friends who struggled with infertility, went through the whole IVF thing (big medical bills, without success) but ultimately had repeat success with the help of modern NFP methods such as NaPro and Billings:

http://www.thebillingsovulationmethod.org/

http://www.naprotechnology.com/

[kareemm]

I can just hear the guy who wrote the software for creating UK birth certificates: "I know for sure that I need to display two parents max on these."

And I feel for the poor programmer whose job it is to deal with the brand-new edge case of putting three parents' names on one.

[thisone]

IVF can currently involve 5 people as it is. Sperm donor, egg donor, surrogate, couple whose child this will be.

This method ups it to 6.

[logfromblammo]

Make the parents field a list without fixed length, ordered by fraction of donor genes. Include exceptions for specific gene identifiers from a different mix of donors.

The default case would therefore be [[0.5 Mom, 0.5 Dad], [mDNA:1.0 Mom]] for girls, and [[0.5 Mom, 0.5 Dad], [mDNA:1.0 Mom], [23X: 1.0 Mom], [23Y: 1.0 Dad]] for boys.

For clones, it would be [[1.0 Nuclear Donor],[mDNA:1.0 Egg Donor]].

For parthenogenesis, it would be [[1.0 Mom]].

For the new UK case, it would be [[0.5 Mom, 0.5 Dad],[mDNA:1.0 Egg Donor],...].

If, for some reason, a cloned baby had the Bt pesticide genes inserted, it would be [[1.0 Nuclear Donor],[mDNA:1.0 Egg Donor],[[Cry1A.105, CryIAb, CryIF, Cry2Ab, Cry3Bb1, Cry34Ab1, Cry35Ab1, mCry3A, VIP]:1.0 Bacillus thuringiensis],...].

The real problem is finding the person to rewrite the Crystal Reports to accommodate the new data structure. Feel sorry for that person.

[bayesianhorse]

For most purposes I think two parents would be enough, even if the child was born using more than two parents. Generally the decision to have a child, and the decision to be a family is complicated enough with two people.

A third person to have "rights" over the child can only mess up stuff.

[efaref]

I really hate this sensational "from three people" thing.

It's a mitochondria transplant.

We don't start calling people "frankenstein's monsters" because they've had a lung transplant, even though that technically makes them a "person from FOUR people!" Shock!

[recibe]

Its not sensational because of the clickbait title.

It is sensational because it is an example of the state sanctioning the customization of human eggs and embryos - which is a pivot of public policy that creates vast consequences.

[throwaway3425]

Mitochondrial diseases can be shitty, shitty things - I have multiple siblings with untreatable and debilitating effects from it.

I didn't know they could even do this (technically), so this news gave me tears of joy.

I am lucky on two counts, to be male (can't pass it on) and also not (yet) had any symptoms myself. It must be horrible for any female who has to decide whether having kids is worth passing those risks on to their offspring.

[arethuza]

BBC Radio 4 had an interview with the mother of a kid suffering from these kinds of problems yesterday and, as a parent, it nearly had me in tears.

They had some daft Conservative MP on as well trying a "slippery slope" argument but he completely missed the point about it being mitochondrial DNA so sounded, at least to me, rather silly.

[aroch]

Out of curiosity, presumably your mother knew she had defective mitochondria so why did she elect to have children?

[Eye_of_Mordor]

An Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman walked into a pub and bought himself a pint...

[m_mueller]

It seems to me that the 'three people' metaphor is a bit misguided. I'd look at it as an organ donor-ship to an embryo - just a special organ that gets copied into every cell.

[geographomics]

I think "three people" is okay as it correctly gets across how many contributors there are of genetic and other biological material.

Some other sources have been referring to "three-parent babies" though, which doesn't seem right, as the mitochondrial donor has no maternal role or rights to the baby.

[tomp]

It's not, really, it's the other way around. The "mother's" nucleus is transplanted into the donor's nucleus-less egg (which has all the mitochondria). The appropriate analogy would be transplanting one person's brain into another person's body.

[wtallis]

It isn't just copied into every cell, it's also heritable—just a very insignificant inheritance.

[brianpgordon]

> Other groups, including Human Genetics Alert, say the move would open the door to further genetic modification of children in the future - so-called designer babies, genetically modified for beauty, intelligence or to be free of disease.

There are people who don't think this is a good thing?! If we could eliminate congenital disease, and make everyone smarter, it would be like fast-forwarding human evolution.

[3d8995163]

And the kids whose parents couldn't afford to have them genetically improved? They just exist as some sort of permanent underclass?

If you think the inequality and the way poor people get treated is a problem now, wait until rich people are actually genetically superior to the poor.

[trhway]

i'm completely agree with you about it being in general a great progressive thing, a dream come true.

The devil is always in implementation details. I can't avoid amazement about extrapolating Monsanto DNA-modified seeds tight licensing control unto human "designer" genes.

[vegancap]

I'm rarely proud of our government. But this was really forward thinking and really set a good example.

[Crito]

Does anybody know why the "embryo repair" method would be used if the "egg repair" method was also an option? Is the embryo-repair method meant to weed out donor eggs that were not viable (by first ensuring that they can at least be fertilized, by fertilizing them)?

[bayesianhorse]

The reason why some people believe this to be an ethical problem, and others don't, is that the questions "What constitutes a human being?" and "When does a part of another Human body become a human being?" are hotly disputed.

It's hard to say for certain what aspects of "humanity" is carried by mitochondria. So some will say that there are two mothers, others will say there is only one.

Some will say this is unnatural or violates religious beliefs. In my opinion it's a wide leap to say some reproductive technique is evil just because the people writing holy texts didn't conceive of it a few centuries ago.

[stefantalpalaru]

What are the legal rights of the parent who contributed only her mitochondrial DNA?

[maxerickson]

It would be absolutely stunning if the law gives them any rights at all.

[ck425]

I believe the proposals state that the mitochondrial donor has no legal rights in regards to the child.

[M2Ys4U]

As I understand it they have the same rights as an organ or blood donor - none.

[V-2]

The article feels pretty one-sided. Ethical dilemmas are more mentioned than actually explained to the reader, while there was space for two interviews with women in favor of the technique (giving that side of the story a personal tone; no sceptic is interviewed, they're just "some people"), plus these emotionally loaded, cheesy subtitles ("life-saving", "proud")...

[fmax30]

My take on this is that either make it free for everyone or don't do it at all. If you only allow the rich to have this treatment ( is there a better word for it) then you are artificially inviting a whole new brand of racism and social inequality into the system.

Also everyone should watch Gattaca, it is one of best movies that shows how social inequality can arise in situations like these.

[alexandros]

On your first point, most new things are subsidised by the rich at the start, and end up mass produced so the middle-class can have them, often times becoming commoditised to being in the reach of almost everyone. Computers are a good example. The world hasn't divided because of this. The divisions usually come in the form of "zero-sum" status goods such as high-end brands or jewelery that has little instrumental value.

On the second point, Gattaca is a fictional tale, and as such should not be used as evidence to "show" anything. It is, at best, a hypothesis, and one not optimised for accuracy, or subjected to any scrutiny at that. http://lesswrong.com/lw/k9/the_logical_fallacy_of_generaliza...

[PJDK]

Although it is probably too early to say (I imagine efficacy vs cost will need to be evaluated by NICE), this is likely to be available on the NHS.

[BadCookie]

I wonder how people will feel about two men being genetic parents to one baby (with the help of a surrogate mother) once it becomes technologically possible. In that case, no disease is being avoided, but I don't think it falls under the realm of a "designer" baby either. My guess is that many of us will live to see it happen.

[barking]

Re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic doesn't seem like quite the right metaphor but at a time when the world's population is exploding this doesn't seem like our most pressing problem.

[mikerichards]

So was this banned before?

[maxerickson]

Yes (at least, in the UK). The brief here:

http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/research/brie...

Mentions the "The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008" which banned implantation of a genetically modified embryo. There is a provision in that act for Parliament to approve regulations that provides exceptions for the treatment of mitochondrial diseases.

More: Here's the section of the act:

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2008/22/section/26

[geographomics]

Yes, it was explicitly banned in 1990, with the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act. In 2008 the government modified the act to allow mitochondrial transfer under future regulations, which enabled such research to take place on human tissue [1].

[1] Section 4 of http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukdsi/2015/9780111125816/pdfs/...

[Vladipoteur]

Just to add for (evolution): GATTACA Argument Darwinism

We have to keep in mind that, e.g. in Japan the fertility rate is 1.4/woman.

The rich people make less children than poor.

Beside, in rich countries fertility rate is dropping, especially in big cities.

Therefore, one way of seen this could be just as palliative.

[MileyCyrax]

>But Frank Dobson, a former former health secretary,

So, a health secretary?

[e0m]

One could have a Mom, Dad, and ???

[M2Ys4U]

Another mother. The nucleus from the "true" mother is transplanted into a healthy donor egg (or embryo) that has had its nucleus removed but still has its healthy mitochondria.