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London – British scientists have used genetic modification techniques to prevent the spread of avian influenza in laboratory-grown chicken cells – an essential step in the production of genetically modified chickens capable of ending a pandemic human flu.
Bird flu viruses are currently spreading rapidly among wild birds and poultry and can sometimes spread to humans. Global health and infectious disease experts cite as one of their main concerns the threat of a human influenza pandemic caused by a strain of bird flu that causes such a jump and turns into a deadly, airborne form that can easily move from one person to another.
In the latest study, modifying some of the chicken DNA in lab cells, researchers at Imperial College London and the Roslin Institute at the University of Edinburgh prevented the bird flu virus to implant in cells and replicate.
The next step will be to try to produce chickens with the same genetic change, said Mike McGrew of the Roslin Institute, who co-led the research. The results were to be published in the scientific journal eLife June 4th.
"This is an important advance that suggests that we might be able to use gene editing techniques to produce chickens resistant to bird flu," said McGrew. in a statement.
"We have not produced any birds yet and we need to check if the change in DNA has any other effects on the bird cells before we can move on to the next." Next step. "
Block the virus
Subsequently, the team hopes to use the gene modification technology CRISPR to remove some of the DNA from the bird responsible for producing a protein called ANP32, which all influenza viruses need. to infect a host.
Laboratory tests of cells modified to be devoid of the gene have shown that they resist the influenza virus – blocking its entry and stopping its replication and spread.
The record of the last influenza pandemic in 2009-2010 – due to the H1N1 strain and considered relatively benign – had risen to about half a million people worldwide. The history of the Spanish flu of 1918 killed about 50 million people.
Wendy Barclay, professor and influenza virology chair at Imperial Oil who was working with McGrew, explains that the idea of developing gene-resistant influenza chickens is to "stop the next flu pandemic at the source ".
And she said the work to date has been promising: "We've identified the smallest genetic change we can make to chickens that can help prevent the virus from spreading."
Reuters
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