Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

triffid_boy t1_iw3qvhw wrote

Reply to comment by Cersad in How do medical researchers obtain lab animals with diseases like specific forms of cancer which arise spontaneously? Do they raise thousands of apes and hope some eventually develop the disease? by userbrn1

It's not the technical difficulty, but the ethical difficulty.

Crispr is already in use in patient cells for things such as Car-t therapy. And we are primates.

38

Cersad t1_iw3sn6i wrote

Right, but primates are also the only animal model that is appropriate for more complex etiologies. A genetically-defined model marmoset or macaque of neurological disorders would arguably be a better model than any rodent could aspire to.

11

FiascoBarbie t1_iw43vel wrote

For some things. Rodents with Parkinson’s like syndromes have most of the same stuff as humans. Linguistic aphasia’s not so much.

What particular neurological disorders do you think are not well modeled in rodents and what would the better alternative be ?

4

Welpe t1_iw4td6q wrote

Linguistic aphasia not so much?! So the rodents could speak perfectly? And here I was thinking all rodents had problems communicating linguistically!

1

FiascoBarbie t1_iw5j82l wrote

No, obviously rodents don’t have language so they are not a good model for language problems.

That wasn’t clear when I said they weren’t a good model for linguistic aphasia?

4

Delta9ine t1_iw6xhcw wrote

Nah. It was very clear to anyone following the thread who has even the most basic reading comprehension skills.

1

triffid_boy t1_iw40zwc wrote

I mean sure, but you said could feasibly be studied since those recent papers - they were feasible models for a long time now.

2

Cersad t1_iw422d5 wrote

I thought the CRISPR in primates only dated back to 2018-ish, but my memory could be a bit hazy. In the world of NHP research, six years is less than the useful life of the rhesus macaques I've seen in labs.

1

gwaydms t1_iw3s5hv wrote

A young man who had spent much of his life in and out of hospitals with sickle-cell anemia is now being observed for a happier reason: he no longer has the disease. Genetic editing enables him to produce normal red cells. And his germ cells were edited as well, so he doesn't need to worry about having children with SCA.

To him and his family, the risk was worth it. He's just another healthy young man, with the prospect of a normal life.

9

triffid_boy t1_iw40t17 wrote

Risk is minimal, I didn't say there was a risk concern?

2

Chemputer t1_iwol41l wrote

Yes, we are primates. That's why we call non-human primates "non-human primates" when referring to them in a technical capacity, not necessarily when casually discussing something on Reddit, to avoid confusion.

It is, though, due to ethical reasons, much more practically and technically difficult to work with primates than, say, rodents. Getting any procedure approved on primates is going to be infinitely harder, and involve far more precautions, extra steps, difficulty, etc. than a similar procedure with mice, and be far more limited in number of subjects.

1

triffid_boy t1_iwp60md wrote

I think you missed the point of my comment. The implication from the comment I replied to was the technical challenge of Crispr in primates was limiting factor, I used the example of current, clinical, use in humans of Crispr as an argument that it's not a technical limitation that prevents more widespread research in primates.

1

Chemputer t1_iwwh6gt wrote

No, I understood what you were saying. I agree with you to a large extent.

I'm simply saying that ethical difficulty and technical difficulty are intrinsically linked. When you have to jump through more hoops for ethical reasons, it makes it more technically difficult.

1