Fact or Fiction?

1. Fact or Fiction? • A small Western nation has contracted with a private biotechnology company to give the company access to its citizens’ medical records. The nation’s legis-lature made the deal on behalf of it constituents without requiring individualized informed consent from any. • A British company that uses DNA for paternity testing now offers a range of luxury items based on s person’s unique DNA signature. Shoppers can jewelry, rugs and engraved crystal designed in patterns based on their actual DNA sequence. The DNA patterns are reportedly precise enough to positively identify a person

2. Fact or Fiction? • In the 1980’s, British scientists created cross-species chimeras, so called “geeps”, by combining the embryos of sheep and goats and letting them grow to become full sized animals. Now, in a attempt to track and find cures for single gene disorders, American scientists have engineered human “she-male” combinations by injecting human male cells into human female embryos and allowing them to develop for 6 days. • Fertility doctors in the U.S. are able to create an artificial womb made from a woman’s own endometrial cells. Designed to allow women with damaged or missing wombs to conceive children, the artificial womb is made of a matrix of the woman’s own cells grown on biode- gradeable material in the shape of a uterus. Embryos are“implanted” or attached to the artificial womb and transferred back into the woman, and have survived for 30 days.

3. Fact or Fiction? • A well-known artist in the U.S. has created Alba, a genetically engineered fluorescent bunny, as a work of art. The artist worked with scientists in Europe to insert a jellyfish gene (that creates fluorescence) into the embryo of a rabbit, and considers Alba to be part of a critical discussion about transgenic art. The rabbit glows green. • Chinese researchers have created part-human, part-rabbit embryos by inserting the nucleus from a young boy’s cell into the hollowed-out egg of a rabbit. Intended to make embryos for stem cell research, the hybrids developed for several days in vitro. The researchers used rabbit cells because of the shortage of available human eggs.

4. Fact or Fiction? • Scientists in Israel have created a DNA “mini doctor” able to detect an abnormal chemical change in a body and correct it by first making and then releasing a therapeutic chemical cocktail. The socalled “biological computer,” which contains billions of living cells, can perform a billion operations per second and fits inside a drop of water. • U.S. doctors have successfully used stem cells to save a young boy who suffered a heart attack after being shot in the heart with a nail gun. The cells were derived from the boy’s own blood and are part of a worldwide experimental trial to repair cardiac function with stem cells.