[ExI] Surprise! Our Bodies Have Been Hiding a Trojan Horse for Gene Therapy

[Darin Sunley]

That's really cool, but discovering the mechanism is one thing. Building a
working therapy to use it is another thing entirely. And then convincing
the population at large that it's safe and reliable - that'll be the
hardest trick of all. Popular trust in the institution of public health
policy is at an all-time low, and they've no one to blame but themselves.

The politicization of the discourse around the known side-effects of the
mRNA vaccines being currently marketed has probably set genetic therapy as
a field back 30 years or more.

On Tue, Aug 24, 2021 at 6:42 PM John Grigg via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> "Enter SEND. The new delivery platform, described in
> <https://science.sciencemag.org/content/373/6557/882> *Science*, dazzles
> with its sheer ingenuity. Rather than relying on foreign carriers, SEND (
> *s*elective *e*ndogenous e*n*capsidation for cellular *d*elivery)
> commandeers human proteins to make delivery vehicles that shuttle in new
> genetic elements. In a series of tests, the team embedded RNA cargo and
> CRISPR components inside cultured cells in a dish. The cells, acting as
> packing factories, used human proteins to encapsulate the genetic material,
> forming tiny balloon-like vessels that can be collected as a treatment.
>
> Even weirder, the source of these proteins relies on viral genes
> domesticated eons ago by our own genome through evolution. Because the
> proteins are essentially human, they’re unlikely to trigger our immune
> system.
>
> Although the authors only tried one packaging system, far more are hidden
> in our genomes. “That’s what’s so exciting,” said study author Dr. Michael
> Segel, adding that the system they used isn’t unique; “There are probably
> other RNA transfer systems in the human body that can also be harnessed for
> therapeutic purposes.”
>
> https://singularityhub.com/2021/08/24/surprise-our-bodies-have-been-hiding-a-trojan-horse-for-gene-therapy/
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