HIV : Useful Treatments For Infecting HIV

CRISPR is a new gene-modifying tool that has the potential to treat numerous medical conditions by editing genes that are responsible for certain diseases. This technology is based on the ability of bacteria to destroy the DNA of invading viruses. Studies have suggested that this new technology can be applied to human cells, although the idea of chopping up regions of the human genome can be unethical and could even be harmful. In order for the treatment to be administered to a patient, a small piece of RNA and an enzyme that makes a cut in the DNA are delivered to the cells. A biotechnology company, known as Editas Medicine, located in Cambridge, MA, is already designing treatments for conditions of the blood and the eye using CRISPR. For

Once the complex was bound to the DNA, a cut would be made to eliminate and destroy the invaders. 83% of archaeal genomes and 45% of bacterial genomes (Shabbir, M. et al, 2016) were shown to be able to successfully utilize the CRISPR Cas9 system. These are very promising statistics, so it is no wonder that there has been such an advancement in the past few years to bring this technology to eukaryotic cells, mammalian cells and eventually human cells.

As have been described above, HIV can have a potential effect on immunological cells, which are important to protect the body from additional infections such as Tuberculosis (TB), Cytomegalovirus (CMV) and other viral or bacterial infections. An effective treatment is needed to reconstruct what HIV has damaged. Antiretroviral therapy (ART) is a common treatment to stop the viral replication and decrease the disease progression, which may lead to a vast decline of the morbidity and mortality. The standard treatment involves a combination of at least three drugs; often known as a highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) where the most common types are Nucleoside reverse transcriptase

Gene therapy provides many benefits to the patients who undergo it. Biotechnologists believe that a genetic disease can be removed with this treatment. For example, on the U.S. National Library of Medicine website, it states, “Researchers are testing several approaches to gene therapy, including: Replacing a mutated gene that causes disease with a healthy copy of the gene. Inactivating, or ‘knocking out,’ a mutated gene that

CRISPR stands for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeat, referring to the repeating DNA sequences found in the genomes of microorganisms. CRISPR technology allows scientists to make precise changes in genes by splicing and replacing these DNA sequences with new ones. Through these changes, the biology of the cell is altered and possibly affects the health of an organism. The possibilities are endless as this offers opportunities in curing deadly diseases, modifying genes, and changing humanity as we know it. Although bioengineering has been around since the 1960s, CRISPR is significant because of the comparative low costs and the ease of the procedure to

There are other types of gene editing out there but research shows us that CRISPR is fast, precise, and simple. Researchers are developing a way for CRISPR therapy to help with Alzheimer’s all the way to HIV. There are two categories the researchers and people have put CRISPR in: practical and philosophical. The researchers say that the immediate barrier is practical. During the tests, CRISPR has found targets in other parts of the DNA that need fixing other than the intended part of the DNA. Because of this, it may take at least a generation to ensure that it is safe. Some people oppose CRISPR because the oppositionists say it lets people play god but getting medicine every time you get sick with the same thing obscures the natural order of things. The opportunities are getting pushed ahead for treating cancer, childhood diseases that are genetic, and how to understand diabetes better. The one question some people have is whether it’s right to edit genes that are

The author gives a brief history of past genome editing but thoroughly explains the history and mechanism of the CRISPR technology. She elaborates on how the technology has already been used to cure diseases and speculates on its future uses and regulation.

In “Life the Remix,” Alice Park discusses the impact and influence CRISPR has on science as well as its potential and risks. CRISPR—“clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats”—is a technique to alter DNA, virtually for anything involving DNA. Although there have been attempts to edit DNA, none were as cheap and simple as CRISPR. This technique, which is based on the immune system of a bacetria, revolutionizes genetics after the subsequent discoveries of the molecular scissors enzyme: Cas9 and a method to efficiently and accurately edit human DNA using CRISPR, explains Park.

In the future, medical professionals hope to be able to treat or even eradicate a disorder by inserting a new gene into the cell via drug or surgery that will combat or even fix the mutation in the DNA that causes that disease. This therapy is still in the very early stages of experiments, and the ethical questions surrounding it prevents much progress from being made at all. There are many potential health complications surrounding this type of approach: scientists still do not completely understand how genes work and if they can be replaced. CRISPR will be a major tool used in gene therapy. CRISPR, which stands for , is a unique technology that lets geneticist and medical researches edit part of the genome by pinpointing a certain area of DNA and adding DNA, removing DNA, or altering the DNA sequence (Your

Granted there have been other gene editing techniques used before, but by far CRISPR has been reported to have the most potential to revolutionize different areas where the method is applicable. The fields that researchers believe these modification resources will be the most beneficial, include but are not limited to medicine for curing and preventing diseases, creating socially ideal children, and perhaps aiding in the decrease of world hunger. While these goals do seem quite optimistical, scientists have high hopes for what CRISPR will be able to accomplish with time. Currently the system is just now being tested out on living organisms, with the ambition of figuring ways to genetically terminate diseases (2).

Genetic diseases and illnesses have been of much concern for many years, leaving many deceased or with a poor quality of life. Due to the implication of modern medicine and other techniques used for treatments, mortality rates have decreased and the average life expectancy has increased. Unfortunately, every individual responds differently to the type of treatment they need, which is why the implication of personalized medicine is forthcoming. A certain technique that has been distinguished and commended by researchers today is known as clustered regulatory interspaced short palindromic repeats, or CRISPR. CRISPR is associated with Cas9, and it is a popular genome editing technique which can be programmed to target specific areas of DNA and

For example, zinc finger nucleases (ZFN), transcription activator like effector nucleases (TALEN) and clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)-Cas9 have been utilized to successfully disrupt the HIV-1 co-receptors CCR5 or CXCR4, thereby restricting HIV-1 infection. However, the effects of simultaneous genome editing of CXCR4 and CCR5 by CRISPR-Cas9 in blocking HIV-1 infection in primary CD4+ T cells has been rarely reported. Furthermore, combination of different target sites of CXCR4 and CCR5 for disruption also need investigation.

The CRISPR protein contains the Cas9 enzyme that uses a guide sequence within RNA to form base pairs with DNA target sequences. This allows the enzyme to break the DNA at a specific region in the strand (Doudna & Charpentier, 2014). In other words, the Cas9 acts as a pair of scissors in order to cut the DNA at a specific location so that parts of DNA can then be changed by adding in or deleting fragments of the genome. Because CRISPR-Cas9 programming is simple and has the capacity to recognize targets at multiple areas, this has granted for many exceptional developments to be made concerning the editing, modification, regulation, and marking of genomic loci precisely and

“Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a blood-borne virus typically transmitted via sexual intercourse, shared intravenous drug paraphernalia, and mother-to-child transmission (MTCT), which can occur during the birth processor during breastfeeding.” There is no cure for HIV or AIDS but over time different types of medications have been developed that slows down the advancement of the disease. AIDS is a lethal disease that is caused by HIV. HIV destroys the immune system and causes the body to not be able to fight off any diseases.

Genome editing generally had a large time-scale and heavy cost associated with it, however, that is no longer the case due to a genome editing tool named CRISPR-Cas9. This tool is based on a natural system used by bacteria to protect themselves against viruses in which the bacteria disables the virus by cutting the viral DNA with an enzyme called Cas9. The adaptation of this naturally occurring phenomenon into CRISPR-Cas9 has opened the door to many incredible possibilities that were previously thought of as impossible. One possible use of CRISPR-Cas9 may be the curing of retroviruses. In 2015, scientists used CRISPR-Cas9 in the treatment of rats with HIV. The persistent co-expression of the Cas9 enzyme and specific guide RNA significantly diminished HIV-1 replication in infected CD4+ T cell cultures, which saw more than 50% of the HIV-1 virus being eradicated from the rats, as well as them being protected against new infection (Rafal K et al, 2016). This may serve as a pathway to the curing of HIV and other retroviruses. CRISPR-Cas9 could also be used to tackle one of the largest causes of death today, cancer. Cancer is caused by the replication of altered cells that are not recognised by the immune system, causing tumours. CRISPR-Cas9 has already been used to treat cancer in mice. Using Crispr, scientists modified the immune cells of the mice to express proteins on their surfaces called Chimeric