A brief guide to the messy Italian debate on NGTs

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There is great disorder under the heavens of new biotechnology. Judging by the Italian debate on genetic innovation in agriculture, it seems that we no longer know what to call what. We are waiting for the European Commission to present its proposal to regulate ‘new genomic techniques’ (NGTs) on 5 July (see the leaked draft here). But in the meantime, on 9 June, the Italian Parliament approved a regulation in favour of experimentation with ‘assisted evolution techniques’ (TEAs), which are the same thing. However, if you read the official wording (9 bis, drought decree law) this expression is missing: instead, it refers to the deliberate release into the environment for experimental purposes of ‘organisms produced by genome editing techniques through site-directed mutagenesis or by cisgenesis’.

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NGT-leaks: EC confidential proposal circulating online

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The European Commission’s proposal for an updated regulatory framework for New Genomic Techniques is due on 5 July, but someone leaked the confidential document online. In a nutshell, if the modification could also have been achieved naturally or by conventional methods, and the plant has the same risk profile as its conventional counterpart, it should be treated similarly to conventional plants and differently from GMOs (it would not require authorisation, risk assessment, traceability, labelling as GMO, but would be placed in a transparency register). For plants in which editing or cisgenesis has led to results that differ from conventional ones, the current GMO rules apply. You can read the Genetic Literacy Project’s explanation here.

Please note a couple of things environamental NGOs and organic producers should like: herbicide-tolerant NGT plants would remain subject to GMO rules, and all NGT plants would remain subject to the prohibition of use of GMOs in organic production.

Editing by grafting – a new GM-free strategy

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The practice of grafting is ancient, Cato the Censor already wrote about it over two thousand years ago. CRISPR, on the other hand, is a young invention that will empower the future. A new GM-free editing strategy could blossom from the meeting of the two. Let’s call it editing by grafting. Don’t miss the paper published in Nature Biotechnology
by Friedrich Kragler’s group and Caixia Gao’s accompanying commentary. The process is shown in this video, posted on the Plamorf consortium website.

CRISPR from bench to bedside

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The progress of the new therapies of the CRISPR era can be told by interweaving two stories. The first is the one featuring Victoria, Carlene, Patrick, Alyssa, Terry and many others. There are over two hundred patients who have so far undergone some experimental treatment based on genome editing, i.e. the targeted correction of DNA instead of the addition of extra genes as in classical gene therapy. These women and men suffering from serious diseases had to face increasing pain and sacrifice until they decided to pin their hopes on a new type of experimental therapy, which is promising but not without risks. For the unluckiest of them, this act of courage and faith in science was not enough, but for many of these pioneers, life really did change. In fact, there are already dozens of people who have managed to free themselves (hopefully in the long term) from the burden of a rare genetic disease or, in some cases, leukaemia. Along with genetically edited cells, a new normalcy has arrived for them and the chance to finally think about the future.

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Duchenne: a farewell and some timid hope

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The death of pioneer patient Terry Horgan is a warning about the risks of viral vectors but the focus is now on the first gene therapy being approved in the US

On the chellenging frontier of advanced therapies, every death is a pain from which everything possible must be learned. The inauspicious outcome of the individual treatment for Duchenne muscular dystrophy developed by the non-profit Cure Rare Disease for Terry Horgan, and tested solely on this American boy, can teach little about the specifics of CRISPR. Indeed, the death occurred before the molecular editing machine could get into action. But the information on the case, circulated in May on a preprint archive awaiting peer-reviewed, is nonetheless a valuable contribution to the advancement of knowledge in an area where science has no intention of giving up.

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Would you buy a CRISPR salad from these men?

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The company which developed the new vegetable (and is working on new varieties of cherries and berries) was founded by CRISPR top scientists David Liu, Keith Joung and Feng Zhang

By now it seems official. The first CRISPR plant to debut in the US market will not be a commodity for industry or intensive livestock farming, as was the case with classic GMOs in the 1990s. This time genetic innovation enters on tiptoe, with a food product designed for discerning consumers. A new type of salad, as nutrient-rich as a wild misticanza but without the bitter notes that usually relegate brassicas to foods to be eaten cooked (see here).

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Check out the pangenome, the graph of us all

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The new pangenome reference is a collection of different genomes from which to compare an individual genome sequence. Like a map of the subway system, the pangenome graph has many possible routes for a sequence to take, represented by the different colors. Credit: Darryl Leja, NHGRI

We used to imagine DNA as the book of life, the code, the Rosetta stone of Homo sapiens. But the repertoire of metaphors needs updating. Today, our species portrait has taken on the appearance of a network of nodes and relationships. Welcome to the age of the pangenome: the collective genome (pan in Greek means everything) that aspires to become more and more complex, plural, cosmopolitan and inclusive.

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The lesson of Terry, the pioneer patient who didn’t make it

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Terry and Richard Horgan (Courtesy of Cure Rare Disease)

He was the first patient to get a CRISPR therapy for muscular dystrophy. The first to receive a CRISPR treatment made specifically for him. And also the first to try a CRISPR approach that did not aim to change a DNA sequence but only its expression (epigenetic editing). Six months after Terry Horgan’s passing, his brother Richard disclosed the first information on the cause of death.

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Meet Klara, the trasparent CRISPR fish

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The turquoise killifish is a small freshwater African fish and a model organism for studying aging. Now researchers will be able to observe the changes in individuals of this species (Nothobranchius furzeri) much more easily, as a German team has used CRISPR to inactivate three genes in one go, causing their vibrant pigmentation to disappear.

The transparent line, dubbed Klara, was presented on eLife, which also released this video on twitter. The idea is not new, in fact crystal-clear mutants of zebrafish and medaka already swim around in laboratories. But Klara is a valuable new arrival, especially for aging scientists. In fact, despite living only a few months to about a year, these fish show typical signs of mammalian aging including telomere shortening.

Apomixis, the Holy Grail is at hand

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For a long time, it was no more than a botanical curiosity, of interest to a few scholars with a passion for taxonomy and evolution. Today, it has become the Holy Grail of agricultural genetics. We are talking about apomixis, i.e. the ability to produce viable seeds that are completely identical to the mother plant, bypassing the need for fertilisation. “Research has been going in waves, now we are on the crest,” says Emidio Albertini, an apomixis expert at the University of Perugia and the organiser of a recent workshop on the subject at the Plant & Animal Genome Conference (San Diego, 13 January 2023).

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