gene drive
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Under a White Sky Asks if We Can Fix Nature — or if We Even Should
In her 2014 Pulitzer Prize-winning book The Sixth Extinction, New Yorker writer Elizabeth Kolbert explored how humanity has driven scores of species to extinction. In her new follow-up, Under a White Sky, the journalist seeks solutions to the havoc we’ve wrought.
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Genetically Engineering The Natural World, It Turns Out, Could Be A Disaster
For the native species of New Zealand, European settlement was particularly cruel. The country has no endemic land predators, so many of its birds evolved without the typical avian aptitude for flight. Then came Western settlers, and along with them rats, mice, possums, stoats, cats and the occasional misbehaving dog. For these invaders, New Zealand’s…
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Will A Radical Plan To Save New Zealand’s Birds With Genetic Engineering Work?
That the kiwi bird still exists at all is something of a marvel. Its native New Zealand has no endemic land predators, and so the bird evolved to be flightless. Today, its nests on the forest floor are under constant attack by invasive species — possums, rats, feral cats and the occasional misbehaving dog.
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University Students Show How Easy It Is To Use Terrifying Genetic Engineering Technology
The gene drive is quickly becoming one of the most controversial technologies of our time. Its possibilities are at once spectacular and alarming: By using genetic engineering to override natural selection during reproduction, a gene drive could allow scientists to alter the genetic makeup of an entire species. This could be used to eliminate diseases…