worldhealth.net
SOUTH BEND, Ind.--- In 1990 the Human Genome Project started.
It was a massive scientific undertaking that aimed to identify and map out the body's complete set of DNA.
This research has paved the way for new genetic discoveries, and one of those has allowed scientists to study how to fix bad chromosomes.
Case Western Reserve University scientist, Anthony Wynshaw-Boris, is studying how to repair damaged chromosomes.
Our bodies contain 23 pairs of chromosomes, 46 in total, but if chromosomes are damaged, they can cause birth defects, disabilities, growth problems and even death.
Wynshaw-Boris is taking skin cells and reprogramming them to work like embryonic stem cells, which can grow into different cell types.
"We are taking an adults, or a child's, skin cells, said Wynshaw-Boris. We are not causing any loss of an embryo, and you're taking those skin cells to make a stem cell."
Scientists studied patients with a specific defective chromosome that was shaped like a ring. They took the patients' skin cells and reprogrammed them into embryonic-like cells in the lab.
They found this process caused the damaged "ring" chromosomes to be replaced by normal chromosomes.
Read more here:
New DNA discovery could lead to chromosome therapies in the future