Gene Modification in Non-Human Animal for Developing Human Compatible Organs: Ethical, Legal, Clinical and Societal Issues

Abstract

CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) as a gene editing tool is a precise and promising technology. By CRISPR technology, human gene can be introduced into the animal gene pool to develop chimera for human like cells/tissue. However, the long term effects of gene editing in human is unknown. After revisiting the state-of-the-art publications in this discipline, it appears that the possibility of development to full-term chimeric/non-human animal by CRISPR technic for xenotransplantation is a future reality. Concern over the safety and ethical issues of gene modification remain for the xenotransplant recipient and the regulators. Countries like UK and the USA might find a leeway within which they would legally practice the research of development of the “non-human animal” to extract organs genetically compatible with the human body by hovering around the legal terminology. This article highlights the clinical, ethical, legal, and social issues of chimeric non-human animals for developing human-compatible organs. We have predicted how real and near the future is for gene modification and animal-human chimera formation for the purpose of xenotransplantation.

Keywords

• Chimera, CRISPR, ethics, non-human animal, xenotransplant