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Ricki Lewis

Genetic Linkage

Precision Medicine Initiative: Ricki's Pick for Breakthrough of the Year

December 17, 2015
Tags: Precision Medicine Initiative, DNA, human genome, Francis Collins, president obama
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‘Tis the season for Science magazine to name their Breakthrough of the Year, a designation that typically irks me because it implies that science happens suddenly and we all know that of course it doesn’t.

FROM MAN TO MOLECULE TO BREAKTHROUGH
The Breakthrough of the Year began as the Molecule of the Year, which began in 1989 inspired by Time Magazine’s Man of the Year, before said magazine realized that half of us are female. Early Molecules of the Year included such celebrities as p53 and nitric oxide. Read More 
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Genes That Protect Against Dementia (Maybe)

December 10, 2015
Tags: Dementia, Alzheimer's, vascular dementia, kin selection
Elders with excellent cognition and memory help their grandchildren survive.
"Survival of the fittest" is one of the most misunderstood terms in biology. Evoking images of physical prowess, it actually refers to an individual inheriting traits that increase the chances of having fertile offspring, such as brilliant plumage or a high sperm count. But according to an intriguing study published recently in  Read More 
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A Conversation with CRISPR-Cas9 Inventors Charpentier and Doudna

December 2, 2015
Tags: CRISPR-Cas9, gene editing, genome editing
CRISPR-Cas9 works like scissors on double-strand DNA. (NHGRI)
At the American Society of Human Genetics meeting in October, CRISPR-Cas9 inventors Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier accepted the Gruber Genetics Prize, then stopped by the press room. For me, this was a little like sitting down with Bono and Bruce Springsteen, but the women were wonderfully down-to-earth, and a little stunned at all the attention since they published their key paper in 2012 on the technique that is speeding gene editing and making genome editing a reality.

This week an International Summit on Human Gene Editing held in Washington DC discussed the potential promises and pitfalls of gene editing technology. A terrific review is here. For those of us who were around at the debut of modern biotechnology in the 1970s, it’s déjà vu all over again. I hope the outcome will be the same. Although concern over recombinant DNA technology back then began with alarm, it basically ended with not triple-headed purple monsters, as my then-grad-school advisor dubbed the concern, but with a new and more targeted source of drugs, beginning with human insulin.

Below are selected comments from Drs. Doudna (a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator and professor of molecular and cell biology and chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley) and Charpentier (director of the new Max Planck Institute of Infection Biology in Berlin) from their talks and visit to the press room in October. I’ll cover here what I didn’t a few weeks ago here and in Medscape to accompany the conference. Read More 
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Turkey Genetics 101

November 24, 2015
Tags: turkey genome, turkey genetics
I love watching the turkeys on Martha’s Vineyard. They travel in small family groups of two parents with chicks and adolescents, coalescing into larger tribes.

When it rains, wild turkeys go about their business, pecking at food – I’ve yet to see one raise it’s mouth and drown. And they have feelings. My daughter and I once watched as 4 turkeys stood around a comrade who’d just been run over, clearly distraught. None left, even as cars went by. Read More 
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Will Layla Save Gene Editing?

November 14, 2015
Tags: gene editing, CRISPR, TALENs
(Great Ormond Street Hospital)
I had planned to blast last Thursday’s news of the use of gene-editing to save a British baby from aggressive leukemia. “Two months later, Layla was cancer-free,” proclaimed one of many enthusiastic reports.

I’m always skeptical when I hear the words “cancer” and “cure” in the same sentence, let alone uttered so soon after treatment and without an accompanying technical paper so I can see the data. But when I considered the timing of unfolding events, I realized that the seemingly premature reporting of Layla’s rapidly restored health just might add an important point to the heated discussion over gene and genome editing. That is, can we keep the promising clinical applications on somatic cells, while forbidding the Frankenstein scenarios of germline manipulation? Read More 
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Jono Lancaster Fights Treacher Collins Disease With Attitude

October 28, 2015
Tags: Treacher Collins Syndrome, rare diseases, NORD
Jono Lancaster spoke at the National Organization for Rare Disorders (NORD) Breakthrough Summit, October 21.
When Jono Lancaster was born 30 years ago, his parents took one look at his face, and abandoned him. Today Jono, who has Treacher Collins syndrome, travels the world meeting kids with the condition and encouraging them to harness the greatest tool against the genetic disease – a positive attitude. Jono kicked off the National Organization for Rare Disorders (NORD) Breakthrough Summit October 21 by sharing his story.

People with Treacher Collins syndrome do not have certain facial bones, and about half have hearing loss. Only 1 in 50,000 people in the US has it, and about 1 in 10,000 in the UK, Jono's home. Most cases are autosomal dominant and due to mutations in the TCOF1 gene.

But this post isn’t about DNA. It's about an incredible young man who is smart, funny, and caring, and quite beautiful. Here in Jono’s own words, from the NORD conference:

“I was born with a genetic condition that affects my facial features. I have no cheekbones, and so my eyes dip down. I love my little ears, they don’t get cold at night. But I do need hearing aids.

I’m one of the lucky ones. More severely affected individuals need help with feeding and breathing. I met some kids who’ve had more than 70 surgeries to correct problems that would make their lives easier.

My birth parents had no idea. When I was born, they were in total shock. I was out of the hospital 36 hours after I was born. Social services found someone to look after me. The foster carer was a lady called Jean. She was very short, and all her kids were grown, and she had so much love to give. Social Services told Jean there was a child in hospital whose parents were horrified, and there was no maternal bond. Jean said, “How could you not love a child?” She took one look at me and said, “Hell yeah, let’s make this happen!” Read More 
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Sequencing the Genomes of Dead People

October 16, 2015
Tags: DNA, bioethics, sequencing, human genome, ASHG
Last Wednesday, at “Career Night” during the American Society of Human Genetics annual conference in Baltimore, I was stationed next to Robert Steiner, MD, from the Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation in Wisconsin. With young scientists circling us like electrons around nuclei, I never got the chance to break away to talk to him. But I did overhear him discussing the Genomic Postmortem Research Project, an effort to sequence the genomes of 300 dead people.

I was fascinated.

Would knowing the information encoded in the DNA of the deceased have changed their health care? I went to the talk on the project the next day to find out about this clever test of the value of genome sequencing. Read More 
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Precision Medicine: Much More Than Just Genetics

September 25, 2015
Tags: Precision Medicine Initiative Cohort Program
When President Obama uttered the words “Precision Medicine” in the state-of-the-union address, I scoffed at a politician’s finally noticing a field that’s been around for decades: medical genetics. Was it another case of rebranding, as chemistry has morphed into nanotech? But the definition of Precision Medicine that has emerged is, well, precise: “An approach to disease treatment and prevention that seeks to maximize effectiveness by taking into account individual variability in genes, environment, and lifestyle.” Read More 
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Tess's Tale: Social Media Catalyzes Rare Disease Diagnosis

September 17, 2015
Tags: rare diseases, Baylor College of Medicine, Tess Bigelow, Undiagnosed Diseases Network, NORD
Tess Bigelow
Attention to the plight of families with rare diseases continues to grow this week, providing a backdrop to another compelling tale of a family seeking a diagnosis for mysterious symptoms.

THE UNDIAGNOSED DISEASES NETWORK
The National Human Genome Research Institute’s Undiagnosed Diseases Network (UDN) just announced the UDN Gateway. This online application portal will guide patients to a growing national network of clinical sites, including six new ones and two genome sequencing centers. The Gateway replaces paper-based application to specific clinical centers for the few coveted slots. Read More 
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Targeting Cancer: A Basketful of Hope

September 14, 2015
Tags: cancer, precision medicine, basket study, José Baselga, melanoma, MATCH, BRAF, The Cancer Genome Atlas, Zelboraf
Basket studies allow researchers to evaluate considering a cancer's mutations in choosing treatment. (NHGRI)
Targeted treatments for cancer have been extending and saving lives for more than 15 years — precision medicine isn’t a new idea in oncology. Now drugs pioneered on select, specific cancers are, one by one, finding new applications.

The first wave of targeted drug approvals were for cancers associated with specific mutations. Herceptin (traztuzumab) led the way, approved in 1998. It’s a monoclonal antibody deployed against the HER2/neu receptor that is overabundant in some aggressive and early-onset breast cancers. Robert Bazell’s excellent book Her 2 tells the tale.

In 2001 came the blockbuster Gleevec (imatinib), a small molecule tyrosine kinase inhibitor that intercepts signals to divide. Erin Zammett’s My So-Called Normal Life with Cancer relates that story. A very young editor at Glamour magazine when a routine check-up revealed chronic myelogenous leukemia, Erin’s recovery was one of the first of thousands thanks to this now famous drug. Read More 
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