Josiah Zayner, a former employee of NASA, would have managed to modify his DNA in order to become a superman. He is the first “biohacker” in history
A young scientist, Josiah Zayner, presented his project for a kit based on the “CRISPR” technique at a conference in San Francisco. He would have succeeded in injecting into the body and into its DNA, 2 elements which would make it possible to block a protein, myostatin, by using the technology of the genetic scissor “CRISPR”. Thus blocked, the modified myostatin would no longer be able to prevent muscle growth.
The objective pursued is to build muscle capacity and become a superman. During the conference, he even demonstrated the safety of his kit by injecting its solution into his arm to transform the genes of his muscles and make them fat.
DNA modification within everyone’s reach
Josiah Zayner says anyone can do it now. You don’t need to be a great scientist to edit your DNA yourself, from home, without medical assistance … but with the complete kits offered by your start-up “The Odin”, created in 2015.
Its kits are based on the “CRISPR” method, a revolutionary technique that allows a specific part of DNA to be “cut” in order to replace one gene with another.
Called “genetic scissor”, the “CRISPR” technique was developed in 2012 to cure orphan genetic diseases by replacing pieces of DNA altered by new genes “like replacing a damaged brick in a wall without breaking the wall” .
Genetic scissors not so precise
If Josiah Zayner maintains that the modification of DNA by “CRISPR” technology should be within everyone’s reach and not just for scientists and large companies, the scientific community warns against the risk of self-injection this type of material. The risk is initially infectious and there is always the possibility of triggering an uncontrollable general inflammatory reaction.
Above all, even carried out in the best laboratories in the world, this “CRISPR” technology is not 100% precise and the real risk is to modify in the process another gene, close to the one you want to modify, and to end up with serious illness by deficiency of the affected gene or even cancer.
Waiting for scientific data
This is why this technique has mainly been used up to now outside the body, in a test tube, to check that it works before reinjecting the modified cells. A first experiment directly in the organism has just been carried out by an experienced research team, but the researchers recognize that in the current state of knowledge “it works or it breaks”.
So far, the injections performed by Josiah Zayner on himself have not affected his body and no concrete results have yet manifested in his muscles. But the hype caused by his statement is expected to favorably affect the marketing of his kits if the US drug agency, the FDA, allows them to be marketed.
It will be difficult without a stronger case, but he always has the possibility of dispensing with this authorization and disseminating them via the internet.
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