PIGS really could save our bacon. Organs that are invisible to our immune system and so won鈥檛 be rejected when they are transplanted could be ready within 10 years, thanks to a faster way of genetically engineering pigs.
Progress towards these 鈥渪别苍辞迟谤补苍蝉辫濒补苍迟蝉鈥� has stalled through lack of funding and problems with the cloning technique used to engineer the pigs. Now there is a simpler way. The new technique will alter the DNA in a boar鈥檚 sperm cells, and therefore in any future offspring, by injecting a virus into its testicles carrying the desired genes 鈥� such as those used to 鈥渄isguise鈥� pig organs. When the boars breed naturally, they should pass on the genetic changes to their piglets.
of Hammersmith Hospital in London, who is developing the technique with Carol Readhead of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, revealed at a press conference in London last week that they have got their technique to work in six boars. The pigs鈥� sperm carried a jellyfish 鈥渕arker鈥� gene that glows green. The plan is to test tissue from piglets sired by the boars to see if they inherited the gene.
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