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Response to “Germ Line Therapy to Cure Mitochondrial Disease: Protocol and Ethics of In Vitro Ovum Nuclear Transplantation” by Donald S. Rubenstein, David C. Thomasma, Eric A. Schon, and Michael J. Zinaman (CQ Vol 4, No 3)

Altering the Mitochondrial Genome: Is it Just a Technical Issue?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 1999

Imre Szebik
Affiliation:
Clinical Trials Research Group, Biomedical Ethics Unit, at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec

Abstract

Technical, ethical, and social questions of germ-line gene interventions have been widely discussed in the literature. The majority of these discussions focus on planned interventions executed on the nuclear DNA (nDNA). However, human cells also contain another set of genes that is the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). As the characteristics of the mtDNA grossly differ from those of nDNA, so do the social, ethical, psychological, and safety considerations of possible interventions on this part of the genetic substance.

Type
RESPONSES AND DIALOGUE
Copyright
© 1999 Cambridge University Press

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