High School Students Learn the Basics of Base Editing to Cure GFP … – University of California San Diego

The goal of the program is not only to make base editing accessible to high school students, but also to encourage critical thinking and reflect on base editing in social and cultural contexts. Komors team asked students to think about the difference between a disease and a trait and to consider the implications of germline genome editing, in which edits are inherited by all future descendants of the edited individual, regardless of whether those descendants consent to the procedure.

The ethical discussion is what hits a home run with the students, said Vasquez. Theyll be responsible for future gene-editing policies. Its interesting to see them thinking about the ethical side of science.

Weve had some really good discussions about what is a disease and what is a trait, stated Evanoff. If we have the ability to make genetic-disease corrections, who will be able to afford those treatments? Where does the equitability lie in this technology? We don't have the answers to that. I say to students, That's going to be your job to figure out!

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation (MCB-2048207), the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (T32 GM007240-41), the National Institute of Health (T32 GM112584), the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (GT13672 and the Gilliam Fellowship Program) and the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship Program.

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High School Students Learn the Basics of Base Editing to Cure GFP ... - University of California San Diego