We Should Resist Making “Synthetic Embryos” Too Realistic

We Should Resist Making “Synthetic Embryos” Too Realistic

A rendering of emerging medical technology.

(© chombosan / Fotolia)


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Insoo Hyun
Insoo Hyun (PhD) is Associate Professor of Bioethics and Philosophy at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland, Ohio. He chaired the Subcommittee on Human Biological Materials Procurement for the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR). He also served as Co-Chairperson of the ISSCR Task Force on International Guidelines for the Clinical Translation of Stem Cells. Most recently, Dr. Hyun served as a member of the ISSCR Working Group that revised the ISSCR’s 2016 guidelines for basic and translational stem cell research. Dr. Hyun has authored over 50 scholarly articles in journals such as Science, Nature, Cell Stem Cell, and The Hastings Center Report. His book Bioethics and the Future of Stem Cell Research was published by Cambridge University Press in 2013.
Hidden figures: Five black women that changed science forever

Dr. May Edward Chinn, Kizzmekia Corbett, PhD., and Alice Ball, among others, have been behind some of the most important scientific work of the last century.


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Sarah Watts

Sarah Watts is a health and science writer based in Chicago.

natural killer cell
NIAID, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

On today’s episode of Making Sense of Science, I’m honored to be joined by Dr. Paul Song, a physician, oncologist, progressive activist and biotech chief medical officer. Through his company, NKGen Biotech, Dr. Song is leveraging the power of patients’ own immune systems by supercharging the body’s natural killer cells to make new treatments for Alzheimer’s and cancer.

Whereas other treatments for Alzheimer’s focus directly on reducing the build-up of proteins in the brain such as amyloid and tau in patients will mild cognitive impairment, NKGen is seeking to help patients that much of the rest of the medical community has written off as hopeless cases, those with late stage Alzheimer’s. And in small studies, NKGen has shown remarkable results, even improvement in the symptoms of people with these very progressed forms of Alzheimer’s, above and beyond slowing down the disease.

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Matt Fuchs
Matt Fuchs is the host of the Making Sense of Science podcast and served previously as the editor-in-chief of Leaps.org. He writes as a contributor to the Washington Post, and his articles have also appeared in the New York Times, WIRED, Nautilus Magazine, Fortune Magazine and TIME Magazine. Follow him @fuchswriter.