I don't know much about it, but CRISPR seems to be a potential method for 'gene therapy' / 'enzyme replacement therapy'. The hypothesis seems to have been known for a few decades, but it seems it has only been shown to work on mice recently, to treat the genetic disorder tyrosinemia. Presumably it has a long way to go until it is might be available as a therapy for humans. It seems to be basically a 'gene editing tool' that can correct errors in the genetic code. It seems to have evolved from a way bacteria protect themselves from viruses.
The good thing about 'gene therapy' methods is that presumably they may be adapted to repair any/most enzyme faults in humans. In the case of what is known as 'fecal body odor' (in practice may be 'sulfides and amines of a certain structure malodor'), my own current opinion is that FMO3 enzyme may be the enzyme most likely 'at fault' for the majority of 'fecal body odor' cases, so any 'gene therapy' would be targeted at FMO3 (if I was correct).
So CRISPR news is something to look out for.
Incidentally, tyrosinemia is a terrible disease that ruins a person's liver in particular, due to an inability to break down tyrosine. Tyrosine is supposed to give off a cabbage smell. Anyone with 'severe' genetic tyrosinemia (type 1 ... i.e. due to severe enzyme deficiency) will have serious health problems, however I do wonder if 'carriers' may be prone to bursts of the cabbage smell. One difference from this and my suggestion of 'FMO3 malodor' is that tyrosinemia would be a specific smell that never changes, whereas most on the forums report of a wide range of 'fecal/gas/malodorous smells', which to me suggests an enzyme that deals with a wide range of compounds, whereas the tyrosine altering enzyme will probably just deal with tyrosine.
links :
MIT news
PHG Foundation
Youtube search : crispr
Suggest a link in the comments section
0 comments:
Post a Comment