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Credit: Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers
This press release is from GEN Biotechnology, a new peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. publishing outstanding research and perspectives in all aspects of biotechnology. Chief Editor is Professor Hana El-Samad (UCSF). The journal is published online and in print (bimonthly). Visit the GEN Biotechnology website for more information.
This press release is copyright Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. Its use is granted only for journalists and news media receiving it directly from GEN Biotechnology. We encourage journalists to contact the named authors for information on individual papers. Additional sources might include GEN Biotechnology Editor-in-Chief (Dr. Hana El-Samad), Executive Editor (Dr. Kevin Davies), Senior Editor (Dr. Fay Lin) and members of the Editorial Board.
If you have any questions or concerns regarding the content or tone of our press releases, please contact Paige Casey at the publisher
**ALL ARTICLES ARE EMBARGOED UNTIL 7:00 PT / 10:00 EST / 14:00 GMT APRIL 20, 2022 UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED**
Cover Article: Safety Analysis of Food and Milk from Gene-edited Livestock
Horns on cattle are a safety concern to both animals and their human handlers, but current high-producing dairy breeds consist of livestock that are nearly all horned. Genome-editing to introduce the dominant POLLED (hornless) trait to elite dairy bulls can address this problem without negatively affecting milk production and other important traits. In a follow-up to their 2020 report in Nature Biotechnology, and in response to regulatory questions for products from gene-edited livestock, Alison Van Eenennaam (UC Davis) and co-workers gathered empirical data on the health, growth, and nutritional composition of animal products from six offspring of a genome-edited hornless bull.
Writing in the April 2022 issue of GEN Biotechnology, the authors found that these offspring did not differ in growth, health, or development compared with controls, and that nutrient levels in offspring beef, as well as all values except sulfur percentage in offspring milk composition, were within normal ranges.
Given the considerable time and resources needed for such studies, the authors suggest that regulatory product composition studies should be hypothesis driven, risk based, and prompted by the likelihood of novel product hazards. This study documents the wide compositional variability of conventional milk and beef from global databases. It also questions the need for requiring wild-type comparator controls in the regulatory evaluation of gene-edited animals, especially when there is no predicted alteration in product composition, as was the case for POLLED
Contact: Alison Van Eenennaam (University of California, Davis)
Email: alvaneenennaam@ucdavis.edu
Editorial: Generosity of Spirit
From constructive peer review and reducing self-centeredness in scientific collaboration to shifting science funding models, Editor-in-Chief, Hana El-Samad calls for more “generosity of spirit” as a core value and incentive structure in science. She emphasizes how GEN Biotechnology will be a platform that emphasizes how generosity of spirit is not at odds with scientific rigor. “For many at the top of their careers, choosing generosity of spirit is a choice that comes at minimal cost,” El-Samad writes. “We are at a critical point and we cannot afford to stand still. We need to try again – industry and academia need to come together with generosity of spirit to find modern solutions that safeguard a generation of scientists and protect an intertwined future.”
Contact: Hana El-Samad (Altos/UCSF/GEN Biotechnology)
Email: helsamad@altoslabs.com
Label-free Imaging to Track Reprogramming of Human Somatic Cells
The derivation of donor-specific induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) from somatic cells through reprogramming generates a unique self-renewing cell source for disease modeling, drug discovery, and personalized cell therapies. Optical metabolic imaging (OMI) is a noninvasive and label-free two-photon microscopy technique that provides measurements of cellular metabolism at single-cell level. Krishanu Saha (University of Wisconsin-Madison) and co-workers demonstrate that OMI is sensitive to the metabolic and nuclear differences during reprogramming, provide accurate identification of reprogramming status of cells using machine learning models, and subsequently build reprogramming trajectories at the single-cell level. This label-free, nondestructive, rapid, and scalable method to track reprogramming can provide insights into the development of new technologies for biomanufacturing high-quality iPSCs.
Contact: Kris Saha (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
Email: ksaha@wisc.edu
Commentary: The CRISPR Patent Saga
The battle for ownership of the fundamental applications of CRISPR in eukaryotes, most notably Homo sapiens, has sparked the long-running CRISPR patent saga, resulting in a major patent decision in February 2022. In this commentary, Andrew Torrance (University of Kansas) shares his perspective on the contentious patent dispute, between Nobel Laureates Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier and renowned genome engineer, Feng Zhang (Broad Institute), over the legal invention of CRISPR genome editing technology. (The author held a ringside seat as head of Intellectual Property for the Broad Institute from 2019-2021.)
Contact: Andrew Torrance (University of Kansas)
Email: torrance@ku.edu
Commentary: Academia Has an Image Problem: And Early Career Scientists Are Paying Attention
In this commentary, Colin Zamecnik, a postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), discusses the recent exodus of mid-career faculty away from academia and toward biopharma companies and alternatives such as the Arc Institute, Altos Labs, Arcadia, and the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub. From better pay, more flexibility to change jobs, and a high emphasis on translational and impactful research, Zamecnik offers crucial insight into the incentive structures behind the exodus.
Contact: Colin Zamecnik (UCSF)
Email: Colin.Zamecnik@ucsf.edu
Journal
GEN Biotechnology