2009 National DNA Day Online Chatroom Transcript

This is just one question from an archive of the National DNA Day Moderated Chat held in April 2009. The NHGRI Director and many genomics experts from across NHGRI took questions from students, teachers and the general public on topics ranging from basic genomic research, to the genetic basis of disease, to ethical questions about genetic privacy.

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56

Because the use of viruses is known to cause harmful side effects, have scientists involved in gene therapy proposed any alternative methods for inserting genes into cells?      David Bodine, M.D., Ph.D.: I investigate the genetics of pluripotent hematopoietic stem cells (PHSCs) to improve the effectiveness of bone marrow transplantation and to find better ways to use these unique cells for gene replacement therapy. One of the things that is being done is to remove the sequences that cause the problems. This can be done while preserving the parts of the virus that carry the gene where we want it to go. There has been a lot of progress in the last two years in this area and the version 2.0 viruses are much safer. St. Ignatius in IL (student)

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