Engineered Hens Lay Cancer-Fighting Eggs

celardore writes "Hens that lay eggs containing cancer-fighting proteins have been developed in Scotland. While not themselves cancer-antagonistic, the proteins can be used to create drugs that have cancer-fighting potential. The hens are, in effect, factories for cancer drugs. It is still unknown whether the resulting drugs would work in practice, and clinical trials are 5 years off. This research was conducted by the Roslin Institute, the ones responsible responsible for Dolly the sheep, the world's first cloned mammal."

Eggs?

[MMC Monster]

Man, think about the cholesterol! I'm waiting for eggs that contain a statin and lower my cholesterol.

But seriously, why is this so much better than using a virus or phage as the vector for reproducing a protein?

Thus it begins

[Leto-II]

So now we've created Axlotl Hens? Next step, Axlotl tanks.

Re:Okay, no serious posts yet, so I'll bite

[Nutty_Irishman]

Dealth is something we all have to face some day. Whether it be from Cancer, Heart attack, or a car accident. We joke about it because it's our way to relate to something that we know will happen to us.

Me, I'm not worried about death itself, but the way I go. Every 10 years, the average life expectancy increases by 2 1/2 years-- yet very little has been done to increase the quality of life in our later ages. I'd rather die young while my quality of life is good than older stuck in a nursing home having some one take care of me. We can make as many miracule drugs we want that prolong the life of an individual, but if we don't do something to make that life worth living for, then we have defeated the purpose. That's why I view stories like these as bittersweet.

Re:5 years. at least.

[kokyuho]

Ho Hum. Nice article but a bit anticlimactic. These guys are NOT the first to do this. Roslin institute is more than a year behind at least one other company. A good friend of mine, by the name of William MacArthur who is a brilliant Molecular Biologist, founded a company called Geneworks in Ann Arbor, Michigan several years ago with the goal of creating transgenic chickens that do exactly the same thing as the chickens described in the article. He succeeded and more than a year ago had pure-breeding, transgenic chickens. Before anyone else in the world. He had been in regular contact with Amgen, Genentech, and all the "Big Boys" and also received FDA certification. In addition to creating the chickens, he developed a simple and cheap way of extracting whatever protein had been created from the egg. His company had either one or two huge chicken barns in Southeastern Michigan and they just needed a bit more capital to make it "over the hump" and really take off. Ironically enough, none of the big companies would give him the relatively small amount of capital that he needed to continue because, as he explained it to me, their risk assessment programs were all based on drugs manufactured in a drug factory and as such, they had no way to evaluate his new methods, so they wouldn't give him any funding and Geneworks had to shut down in August 2005. I happened to stop in at their offices as they were loading up the equipment and getting ready to auction it off. However some of his transgenic chickens were donated to a university (I don't remember which one) so that the line could continue. By the way the folks at the Roslin institute know who Bill Mac Arthur is and what he was able to do.