A young biotechnologist is creating “designer pigs” whose organs could be transplanted into humans. Her long-term goal is to rewrite the human genome to create human beings who are healthier, stronger and more intelligent.
This is not science fiction. Luhan Yang, co-founder of the Boston biotech startup eGenesis, already has a working designer-pig farm in China and is inserting human genes into pigs.
EGenesis is not the only company implanting human genes in animals. The Salk Institute announced in March that it had injected human genes into pig embryos—and, as the embryos developed, their organs contained human genes. Human embryos have also been inserted into sheep.
In fact, gene editing has become so easy that researchers are doing some freaky things with it. Harvard geneticists recently embedded animations into living bacteria cells.
And then there’s that very ambitious project to create entire new genomes from scratch. GP-write is an open, international research project that aims to produce novel genomes—human, animal and plant. In other words, it wants to create life forms that have never existed. The group says, “Writing DNA is the future of science and medicine, and holds the promise of pulling us forward into a better future.”
What will that future be like? How far will science – or business – take the hybridization of species?
Chimeras among us
A chimera is an organism with two or more distinct types of cells. So, these designer pigs would be considered chimeras. But how far would this work have to go before chimera pigs would no longer be considered pigs? What’s the borderline between animal and human?
Scientific research constantly attempts to push the boundaries of what’s possible. Then, there’s the startup sector, which has taken Facebook’s mantra of “move fast and break things” to heart. I have no doubt that researchers will push gene editing from both ends, without worrying too much about what they break, while biotech startups will exploit this technology any way they can.
They’ll create animals that have more and more human characteristics, and they’ll modify humans to give them real or perceived advantages.
I can see a scenario where an uber-human manager oversees a factory in which humans work alongside laborers who have the strong bodies of horses or cattle plus enough human intelligence to allow them to follow directions and perform multi-step actions.
Would this be good for society?
Businesses would be happy to be able to purchase chimeric workers the way farmers now buy livestock. You could argue that these human/animal chimeras would be more content at their low-level jobs than a human would; humans would be free to pursue jobs that were more interesting. Or, you could argue that these chimeras were taking jobs away from humans, creating an unemployable class.
Science moves fast
The past year has seen a number of big announcements about human/animal gene splices. And the research is heating up even more.
“We are not near the island of Dr. Moreau, but science moves fast,” National Institutes of Health ethicist David Resnik said during a meeting, reported by Technology Review. “The specter of an intelligent mouse stuck in a laboratory somewhere screaming ‘I want to get out’ would be very troubling to people.”
Even more troubling would be that chimeric factory worker demanding to be paid; demanding the freedom to work where it (he?) wanted; demanding the same rights “real” humans have.
Are we ready to treat interspecies beings with compassion and respect? Given how we treat our fellow human beings, I think not. Bioengineering is about to create problems society isn’t capable of solving.
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Susan Kuchinskas is a science and technology journalist and author of the new science fiction novel, Chimera Catalyst, set in a near-future world where a corporation is creating and selling exotically beautiful female chimeras.
