Scientists Save Child's Life By Growing Him New Skin (scientificamerican.com) 107
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Scientific American: The German doctors realized they had to do something drastic or their seven-year-old patient would die. The boy had escaped war-ravaged Syria with his parents, and a rare genetic disease had left him with raw, blistering sores over 80 percent of his body. His doctors in a children's burn unit tried everything they could to treat his illness, called junctional epidermolysis bullosa -- even grafting some skin from his father to see if it would heal the child's wounds. But his body rejected this. Finally, they e-mailed Michele De Luca, a researcher in Italy, to ask for help.
The doctors took a small sample of skin from one of the few places on the boy's body where it was not flaming red or flaking off, and sent it to De Luca. His team at the center used a virus to insert into the skin cells a correct copy of a gene called LAMB3; the boy's own defective copy had caused his epidermolysis bullosa. De Luca and his colleagues grew the skin cells over scaffolds in their lab to form large sheets, the way doctors often do for burn patients. In two surgeries in October and November 2015, the Italian and German teams covered the boy's limbs, sides and back with these sheets of fresh skin. After being too sick even to get out of bed before his surgeries, "he was standing up already by Christmas," De Luca says. In January 2016 the boy, whose name is not being released to protect his privacy, received a few more skin patches -- and in February he was released from the University Hospitals of the Ruhr University Bochum in Germany.
The doctors took a small sample of skin from one of the few places on the boy's body where it was not flaming red or flaking off, and sent it to De Luca. His team at the center used a virus to insert into the skin cells a correct copy of a gene called LAMB3; the boy's own defective copy had caused his epidermolysis bullosa. De Luca and his colleagues grew the skin cells over scaffolds in their lab to form large sheets, the way doctors often do for burn patients. In two surgeries in October and November 2015, the Italian and German teams covered the boy's limbs, sides and back with these sheets of fresh skin. After being too sick even to get out of bed before his surgeries, "he was standing up already by Christmas," De Luca says. In January 2016 the boy, whose name is not being released to protect his privacy, received a few more skin patches -- and in February he was released from the University Hospitals of the Ruhr University Bochum in Germany.
Why didn't they just bombard him... (Score:3, Funny)
with greasy solar atoms? That would have forced the the body cells to react, to protect themselves. That means growing skin.
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Multi-pass!
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I'm pretty sure that's how he got the disease in the first place.
Re:News? (Score:5, Informative)
The results are published in Nature today.
And so it is indeed news.
https://www.nature.com/article... [nature.com]
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Did you know about it before? It's not like it's gone stale. It takes time to evaluate the result of something like this. Complaining about this particular article "not being news" implies a cynicism in you bordering on Grumpy Old Man status.
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The nationalism you're seeing now in Europe is a reaction to the less savory aspects of a new insurgency, rather than being internally whipped up hatred for a minority that had been a productive and peaceful part of your society for hundreds of years.
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Except this "insurgency" only exists in the minds of the nationalists, just as the hatred for the minority you mentioned.
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A large bunch of people showing up on your doorstep, unvetted by any national immigration system, is an insurgency. At least our own insurgents are Catholic.
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How else could you have heard about it? (Score:1)
If not through it being published?
Also, I want to know these things! And nobody here heard of it before! Which, by definition, makes it news!
Why are you so obsessed with the Plank time unit it arrives in front of your eyes being the Planck time unit it happened? What’s wrong with you?
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No. Publishing history isn't news.
The news is that an in situ gene replacement technique has worked in one patient and is the subject of a paper. The implications of this are very large.
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The real news is that this means they're one step closer to being able to reverse male-pattern baldness!
Re:News? (Score:5, Informative)
The surgeries were done at those times you mention. The skin healing and coming to an equilibrium would take months after that. To confirm it was growing as normal would take more months after that. Tests on samples collected after several months would themselves take months after that. Writing the paper would take months after that. Review would take at least one month. And that brings us up to the present day. Doing the surgery and saying "Well we healed him permanently" the next day would be premature.
This isn't some app some douche made that takes pictures and adds new filters, this is real science, and real science takes time.
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The first skin graft with this method was in October. October to February is up to 5 months.
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How do you define news? And do you understand that your definition isn't the same as the rest of the world?
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I would also defend Dr. Frankenstein to the bitter end. For trying.
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unauthorized
Where do you get this bullshit from?
Why do you believe doctors shouldn't try everything they can to save the live of a middle-eastern girl?
You seem to have a unique flavor or racism where you hate every race.
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They performed a radical and unauthorized medical experiment al la Joseph Mengele on some foreign little brown kid and not a single one of you finds anything grotesquely sick with this!?
Every medical advance began with researchers toying with some cohort of patients. This little boy was about to die after all conventional treatments had failed. All patients who fit this criterion get experimented on. I have a brother who is alive today because when all else had failed was the subject of a radical experiment.
Interestingly, the technique used in the German case was genetic engineering. People like you will refuse such a treatment, and therefore will not be around to influence future generati
Science. It works, bitches. (Score:5, Funny)
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Why not, we'll probably have the tech to do that before the political will to ban forcing the procedure on non-consenting babies.
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Do you support of banning the dismemberment of non-consenting babies as well? (ie, abortion)
Is a child able to consent to trans-sexual surgery with the complete removal of the penis?
Lifes good (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a really great outcome. It would be horrible to have such a debilitating disease. For these scientists to be able to fix his DNA to cure him of this is truly remarkable, and should be applauded. Now, this young boy gets to grow up and have a chance at enjoying life without these sores and the crippling pain that is associated with it.
--
"...to the moon..." - Neil Armstrong
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Now, this young boy gets to grow up and have a chance to create new lives with these sores and the crippling pain that is associated with it.
FTFY.
It's good that we have developed this technology but it is a partial fix. We need to push further with gene therapy to prevent the distribution of genetic ailments. Anything less is unethical treatment toward either one child or many people that have yet to be born. We cannot rely on people with such ailments to voluntarily not pass on their genetic code.
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In situ treatment of a genetic disease is just a first step. Next we apply it to the germline DNA.
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The eugenics solution isn't exactly great either though, even if its not in the form of actively culling people.
Is this gene dominant? If not, then there's a high probability that his children will be perfectly fine, and his children's children and so on given that its a rare condition and the chance that he hooks up with another person who also has it is therefore slim.
But even if its dominant, you never know what his life may bring. Perhaps his experience will lead him into the field of biology and he'l
Why mention Syria? (Score:1)
So no mention of the patient's name, good. But why bother to mention the Syria connection? Does that have anything to do with the treatment or outcome/?
Because it is implied ... (Score:1)
... that some (morons) believe the kid (!) does not deserve it, because happened to be born somewhere else.
Like he chose to be born in a fucking war country...
(And btw, where was that fucking "God" asshole? Mysterious deliberately-letting-kids-suffer ways again?)
And they never fucking realize, that this kid will suck up our (German) culture, and contribute to our society like everyone else. He certainly will not contribute less, than any jobless alcoholic dumbass of a blaming-others failure of a neo-Nazi ev
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And they never fucking realize, that this kid will suck up our (German) culture, and contribute to our society like everyone else.
That would make him the exception.
More likely he'll end up in a parallel society in some big city and live on welfare. This whole "we just have to be extra nice and generous and benevolent and they'll happily integrate and repay us" fairy tale is just that: a fairy tale.
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Be fair now, they said exactly the same about the East Germans and see how they turned out.
Hang on, you might have a point.
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(And btw, where was that fucking "God" asshole? Mysterious deliberately-letting-kids-suffer ways again?)
I see you have read extensively on the problem of theodicy. Hint : Free Will.
Interestingly even if you're not religious the notion that free will and good outcomes for all are incompatible is an important one. It's the basis of this -
https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/j... [loc.gov]
he British ministry have so long hired their gazetteers to repeat and model into every form lies about our being in anarchy, that the world has at length believed them, the English nation has believed them, the ministers themselves have come to believe them, & what is more wonderful, we have believed them ourselves. yet where does this anarchy exist? where did it ever exist, except in the single instance of Massachusets? and can history produce an instance of a rebellion so honourably conducted? I say nothing of it's motives. they were founded in ignorance, not wickedness. god forbid we should ever be 20 years without such a rebellion. the people cannot be all, & always, well informed. the past which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive; if they remain quiet under such misconceptions it is a lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. we have had 13. states independant 11. years. there has been one rebellion. that comes to one rebellion in a century & a half for each state. what country before ever existed a century & half without a rebellion? & what country can preserve it's liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? let them take arms. the remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon & pacify them. what signify a few lives lost in a century or two? the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. it is it's natural manure.
I.e. Jefferson clearly believes that 'a few lives lost in a century or two' in armed rebellion against the state is the price you pay for liberty.
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I don't believe in God. But it is possible to reconcile the existence of evil in the world with an omnipotent God. My favourite argument is that God allows free will and thus evil because a Universe with no free will would be sterile.
You can make a similar case for a God that allows natural law to run without modification after the Big Bang. In fact a lot of the US founding fathers were Deists [wikipedia.org] who believed in just such a God.
A Deist God is actually analogous to a human who sets up a simulation and then lets
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You seem to be arguing that an omnipotent God would be bound by natural laws that somehow supersede him. I'd say that contradicts his being omnipotent.
If you assume God is the guy running the simulation he's not bound by the laws of the simulation. He may be bound by natural laws in the Universe outside the simulation. However he chooses not to override the laws inside the simulation because he doesn't want to stop it producing interesting results.
It's like if you're running Conway's Life you could go in and tweak the cells by hand but that would defeat the purpose of running it. You choose not to. You can't however override natural law in the Universe yo
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In the series "The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever", the author had a nearly-omnipotent evil force on 'earth' who the protagonist battled. The evil force's motivation was to gain control of the magic talisman from the protagonist in order to (a) lay waste to the planet (as evil forces are wont to do) and (b) escape virtual imprisonment to take on the creator.
The omnipotent god of the story had created this universe and cast down the evil force but was unable to directly influence his creation
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Arguably an omnipotent God wouldn't give people the choice about whether they get free will, or in general freedom because they might make the wrong choice.
E.g. look at all the millennials who want to live under 'communism, socialism or fascism'.
https://www.washingtontimes.co... [washingtontimes.com]
Though admittedly if you look at the report it's not as bad as the Washington Times makes out
https://victimsofcommunism.org... [victimsofcommunism.org]
https://imgur.com/a/3LQU6 [imgur.com]
I'd interpret that as most Americans want a free market system, voting for Capital
Re: Why mention Syria? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's a "triumph over adversity" story. That you feel the need to question it shows you are a terrible person.
question everything. (Score:1)
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So no mention of the patient's name, good. But why bother to mention the Syria connection? Does that have anything to do with the treatment or outcome/?
Because for semi-competent news networks its considered good reporting, especially where you aren't permitted to give any personally identifiable information like names. It ads context to the subject (meaning the person, not what the article is about).
I.E. "Today a British man..." or "A woman from Northumberland...". Seriously, it's like saying Andy Murray is Scottish tennis player, his country of origin is mentioned all the fecking time.
But you just wanted to have a bitch about Syria... because? Are you ju
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FYI: Syria is a war zone. That is kinda relevant.
The engineer in me makes up 90% of my interest in this story. How did they make the gene change? How does the body not reject it? Can they apply this therapy to the rest of his body? Could something like this one day cure my son's Neurofibromatosis? This is cutting edge science - science fiction become real. As a science geek, that's cool.
But not all of science is about man's relationship with nature and technology. Much of it is about what drives us.
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And Poe's law in 3 ... 2 ... 1 ...
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If that bothers you, just look at it that way that they used that little expendable refugee to try some new medicine that might one day save good Aryan blood, just like their forefathers did on other expendables.
Should make you feel better instantly.
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Given that it's his normal skin I don't see why it wouldn't. But why are you thinking about the penis of a 7yo?
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To be honest much of criticism of GMO isn't about gene manipulation per se but the type of manipulation and potential risks of it as used. But sure there are plenty of "natural" idiots too - IMO they should be fed 100% natural strychnine.
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Let me guess. Science performs a miracle with the pinnacle of current human understanding. Parents thank their god(s).
Bert
Science performs miracles all the time, that doesn't impress me. What would impress me is religion performing science ;-)
Gene pool (Score:1)
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I'm sure that, as the boy matures, he will be well aware of the ramifications of his mutation, and will be duly hesitant to pass it on. Parents can be jerks to their children in many ways, but knowingly gifting them a terrible (often fatal, but now treatable) genetic mutation is not usually something a parent would do.
There are ways to fix this and prevent the mutation from propagating, howeve
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Parents can be jerks to their children in many ways, but knowingly gifting them a terrible (often fatal, but now treatable) genetic mutation is not usually something a parent would do.
Does not jibe with the world we have now. Families have known that a lot of their ancestors died from the same mysterous illness for centuries. People seem to very much do it.
Wow! (Score:1)
They literally patched his DNA...
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Let's hope there will be no regressions...
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That's what I was wondering. The new skin has the fixed gene in it, but the body creates all new epidermis every, what, six weeks?
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The "old" skin lacks the proteins to bind to the lower layers of skin, the "new" skin has those proteins. I assume this means any old skin that comes off is more likely to be recovered with new. The new skin should simply heal over the rest of the body.
That's my theory. Certainly not the opinion of a trained physician, I don't even play one on TV.
How expensive is this? (Score:2)
I didn't know the ability to grow skin from existing skin cells was so advanced. Does this cost an insane amount? It would seem to be a good way to grown new skin that can be grafted on to replace scarred tissue.
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$2000 per 20x25cm sheet in 2001, plus other costs (transportation, surgery etc). I'd expect the price to come down as the technology gets developed and becomes more widely available. So for a full skin replacement it's pretty expensive, but not unmanageably so. It certainly seems in the realm of affordability for repairing smaller scars. https://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/everyday-innovations/lab-grown-skin2.htm
Another prerequisite technology for SkyNet (Score:1)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt00... [imdb.com]
Kyle Reese: [in a stolen car, while being chased by the police and the terminator] All right, listen. The Terminator's an infiltration unit: part man, part machine. Underneath, it's a hyperalloy combat chassis, microprocessor-controlled. Fully armored; very tough. But outside, it's living human tissue: flesh, skin, hair, blood - grown for the cyborgs.
Sarah Connor: Look, Reese, I don't know what you want from...
Kyle Reese: Pay attention! I gotta ditch this car.
Forewarning (Score:1)
..."left him with raw, blistering sores over 80 percent of his body."...
Well, that's a link I won't click. Thanks for the warning! =-]