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If you introduce foreign stem cells into a foetus before
the
immune system has developed when it does kick in &
calibrate itself it will recognise the foreign cells as
native
to the organism & wont reject them.
We know it works because if it didnt the Cambridge
Geep
(created by mashing
two equally developed early embryos
from a goat & sheep together while they were still just
little balls of unformed cells) could never have existed.
This happens constantly in nature an awful lot of us
who
had siblings in the womb will have small colonies of cells
that migrated to us in the womb.
Sometimes only one of a multiple pregnancy makes it to
term so it can also happen with single births.
They dont even have to be the same sex.
One well-known actress has a small percentage of cells
carrying XY chromosomes floating around her body.
And no shes not a hermaphrodite you need a lot more
than a few migratory floaters for that, probably a 50/50
split which requires two equally developed embryos to
merge in the womb during early development.
If you introduce a few stray stem cells from a younger
foetus into an older embryo thats further along
developmentally they essentially go native taking their
cues from the cells around them & the organism they
find
themselves in.
When its done that way the foreign cells have zero input
in the development of the foetus.
You wont end up with a chimerical creature like you do
when an equal quantity of cells at the same stage of
development are mashed together (like the Geep was).
Monkeys injected with human stem cells this way look
exactly like monkeys, act exactly like monkeys & are just
monkeys.
Pigs injected with human stem cells in an attempt to cut
down on tissue rejection in trans species transplants of
their organs (a completely fruitless avenue of research)
are
also just pigs & have never displayed any non-pig
qualities.
So humans injected with pig stem cells at a
comparatively
late stage of development can be expected to be in no
way
affected by it.
What it would mean is that their immune system when it
does kick in & calibrate will then forever after recognise
those pig cells as belonging & wont attack them if any
organs from that individual animal (or one of the same
tissue type) is transplanted later in life.
No tissue rejection limitless supplies of organ, blood &
skin for emergency grafts.
If you carefully choose an animal without any lethal
recessives (so it can breed with itself) use
chromosomal
engineering to insure all its chromosomes are mirrored
pairs with both sides the same clone it, take a cell
samples & swap out the y chromosome for a copy of the
x chromosome (assuming its male of course, otherwise
swap in a y chromosome) & re-clone it using those cells.
You then have a male & female that you can breed from
normally & all the offspring whether male or female will
essentially be clones of the one animal.
So you can then just breed herds of organ replacement
pigs without all the expensive lab techniques.
I suggest pigs because the organs are generally about
the
right size for humans plus their skin is similar to peoples
so it could be used for emergency skin grafts (a definite
advantage over goats or sheep) I say emergency grafts
because it wont match perfectly (not for everyone) but
it
will certainly do until enough of a bodies own skin cells
can
be cultured to provide a more cosmetically appealing
result.
Some people might worry about people giving birth to
piglets or human pig hybrids if the guest cells end up in
the
testis or ovaries but this really shouldn't be a problem.
1. The guest cells tend to stay where they are put so
inject them in the sole of the foot.
2. Pig sperm cant penetrate a human egg cell (& vice
versa) if it could then what with all the farmyard
perverts that have existed through the centuries it would
already have happened.
3. Even if the sperm could penetrate the egg human &
pig DNA should be incompatible & unable to mesh - we
also have a different number of chromosomes (ok so
chromosomal mismatch isn't always a complete bar to
reproduction, it's not making it any easyer though is it).
4. If the chromosomes & DNA found a way to hook up
the incompatibilities should create enough lethal
combinations to prevent any embryo coming to term
enough embryos with two human genetic parents have
development issues that prevent them coming to term,
so really, what chance do you really think a half human
hybrid has.
5. And even if they were genetically & chromosomally
viable a human womb is a hostile environment for a pig
foetus temperature & ph levels are all wrong & it can
be
a pretty hostile place for fully human embryos (case in
point, Im rhesus negative & mum is rhesus positive,
she
miscarried a previous rhesus negative before me so her
immune system was loaded with antibodies that tried to
kill me in the womb & I came out severely jaundiced) so
once again what chance do you really think a half human
foetus would have in a human womb.
6. Besides all that the cells might not need to survive
in
the body for long past the immune systems calibration so
they could be chemically coshed to prevent cell division
before injection (individual cells should last long enough)
or else killed off after the baby was a few months old
using
the targeted drug delivery methods being developed for
gene
therapy & cancer treatments.
Some research has been put into making animal organs
more compatible for human transplant.
Injecting human stem cells into the animal foetus so it
has
a small percentage of compatible cells for one - but
these cells still need to be tissue typed for the recipient
so even if that worked youd have to maintain several
herds (one for each tissue type) & it doesnt work
anyway.
With that method the vast majority of the cells are still
pig
cells, so still rejected, will be killed by the immune
system
& then rot inside you resulting in gangrene & blood
poisoning, which would kill you if it wasnt for the fact
that
not enough of the organs cells remain for it to function
so you die from the resulting organ failure first.
<Much (much) Later Edit>
Added here to avoid dragging this back to the top & annoying anyone who thought they were done with it ;)
As I said the 'guest' cells stay where you put them & a subsequent Google search suggest the technique is to inject enough cells in specific organs so human cells will be in the majority in them.
So it does work but the patient has to wait for their organ (the animal) to grow, not much use for a fast illnesses or violent accident.
<End of Edit>
Unless you take immune system suppressants & then
the
first time you catch a common cold it develops into full-
blown hypothermia & you die.
Another approach might be injecting pig nucleic DNA into
a
human egg cell & then cloning it.
This would produce a perfectly normal pig in all respects.
As the mitochondria doesnt have any expression in the
organism proper, it merely governs cell chemistry
So I suppose some things like the inability (or not) to
properly metabolise certain foodstuffs might be seated
there (like lactose intolerance?).
Which could explain why some transplant patients claim
cravings for foods they didnt like before but their donor
did.
Theyve just had a chunk of their body replaced with
cells
that may have slightly different chemical / nutritional
requirements from their own & the bodies hormonal
system prompted by those cells is just telling them what
the cells need?
Anyway Im going off topic switching a pigs
mitochondria
& (presumably) its cell wall shape & structure this way
might be hoped to cut down on tissue rejection.
But - going back to my mums immune system (the one
that tried to kill me in the womb) its clear that, as we
share the same mitochondria, tissue type isnt
determined by that (at least not alone).
So that doesnt work either - Ive never heard of
anyone
doing any research on it anyway.
So none of the approaches for adapting the animal
organs to be less prone to tissue rejection Ive come
across (or am able to think of) appear to work.
While inoculating the foetus in the womb against
rejection of the animal tissue will (or so it seems).
And yet I cant find a smidgen of a hint anywhere that
anyone else has considered this.
Oh I know the usual suspects (religious nutters & the
moral majority) would all throw a fit.
But really:
Hows it any worse than rubbing pus from a cowpox
pustule into a small cut in a childs arm to protect them
from smallpox (the original vaccination).
Its not like vaccinations have really changed any since
then, most are still essentially a small dose of chemically
stunned or weakened virus.
Under the guidance of the state parents routinely inject
alien DNA into their children & no one ever bats an eyelid
so why not this.
And just think of the benefits of course its not much
good for those of us that are already here (accept that it
will protect a lot of our existing medical resources from
expanding pressures from new births).
Thoughts? ;)
Stem cell swapping
Stem_20cell_20swapping [Skewed, Jun 01 2014]
Blood Groups
http://www.nhs.uk/c...s/Introduction.aspx [Skewed, Jun 01 2014]
Tissue Typing
http://www.gosh.nhs...or-kidney-donation/ [Skewed, Jun 01 2014]
HLA Nomenclature
http://hla.alleles.org/ [Skewed, Jun 01 2014]
The Contribution Of Farm Animals To Human Health
http://www.ufrgs.br.../farm%20animals.pdf [Skewed, Jun 02 2014]
Cell Therapy - Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_therapy [Skewed, Jun 02 2014]
Xeno's Paradox
http://www.ncbi.nlm...rticles/PMC2711826/ [Skewed, Jun 02 2014]
Ethics Of Chimeric Animals
http://triplehelixb...-and-organ-growing/ I really only included this for the first sentence - 100,000 people waiting for transplants in the US alone, & getting worse - made me think that [Skewed, Jun 02 2014]
The Immune System
http://www.cancer.g...munesystem/AllPages This one is the best of these three [Skewed, Jun 02 2014]
Immune Response
http://www.nlm.nih..../article/000821.htm [Skewed, Jun 02 2014]
What Is The Immune System
http://www.patient....h/the-immune-system [Skewed, Jun 02 2014]
Baked at least fourteen years before.
https://books.googl...v=onepage&q&f=false Xeno: The Promise of Transplanting Animal Organs into Humans, Oxford University Press 2000, by David Cooper & Robert Lanza, "The Induction of Chimerism Before Birth" at the end, page 117 onward in this Google Books link. [Skewed, Mar 23 2018]
a 2014 article outlining the idea in
https://www.ncbi.nl...rticles/PMC4228834/ In utero hematopoietic cell transplantation: induction of donor specific immune tolerance and postnatal transplants [Skewed, Dec 29 2018]
PermaPet
PermaPet How to make some money with it while you wait for approval for human trials [Skewed, Mar 06 2021]
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Whoa! <pulls up a stump and gets comfy> I have no thoughts on this topic yet, but I can't wait to read the discussion. |
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You clearly know where the actual period key is,
because you managed to use it for delimiting your
ordered list. What you apparently are not aware of is
that the big key labeled enter does not also produce
any sort of mark that's appropriate for ending a
sentence without a paragraph break. |
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//can be expected to be in no way effected by it in any way// oink! |
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This is a very interesting idea. |
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Sorry I can't bun it. I think humanity is moving
away from animal exploitation rather than towards
it. I see your comment about moral majority, and
we've all likely benefited from animal-based
medical research. But aren't vat grown human
organs a more likely outcome? |
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Allow me to be the third person to welcome you to
the Half Bakery. |
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Allow me to be the first person to endorse [Voice]'s
welcome. |
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Re. the idea - is there an executive summary with
punctuation? |
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Perhaps all the punctuation was eaten by a transgenic piglet. |
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I like it. And easy to test with the critters first: get
dogs ready for their pig parts. |
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I think that there may be more primal forms of
rejection of xenotransplants than act to reject
transplants from humans. My recollection is that
xenotransplants are rejected really fast - like hours. |
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//My recollection is that
xenotransplants are rejected really fast - like hours// |
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Depends on the animal, it's actually safer to get a
blood transfusion from a chimp of the right blood
type than from a human of the wrong blood type. |
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//Would it be kosher after the operation ?// |
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We could use sheep for those of the jewish faith
(lambs seem suitably biblical after all). The jehovahs
are beyond help of course (I understand they won't
even take a human blood transfusion if they need
one?). |
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Oh no. Now ya done it. Gone and opened the religion
can of worms. See you in a week, when the discussion
is over, [Skewed] |
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// it's actually safer to get a blood transfusion from a
chimp of the right blood type than from a human of
the wrong blood type// |
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I'm afraid I'll have to disagree with you there.
Anyone who has approached an adult chimpanzee
with a needle will tell you that it anything but safe. |
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//aren't vat grown human organs a more likely
outcome?// |
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Probably, but I see this idea as complimentary. |
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Vat grown organs take time & this could be used
for emergency treatment while you wait for the
new vat grown organs. |
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Ok so we do have dialysis machines & the like. But
most of our machine alternatives are cumbersome
& severly restrictive to mobility & lifestyle. This
seems better in almost every way I can think of. |
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Plus it would probably be a lot cheaper & if vat-
grown organs end up in private industry (which
seems possible) then this would provide an
alternative for those that couldnt afford them
(even if it also ends up in the private sector it
would still be a cheaper alternative). |
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Thanks for the welcomes guys. |
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Hmm - I should probably have started from the top &
worked down with the comments. |
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I should have known better (I did read the
Wikipedia page on the sight after all). |
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Sorry about that, not my strong point, I'll make
more effort in future (& have a glance over what
Ive already typed). |
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[Pocmioc], on a similar note, assuming your
referring to the unnecessary double emphasis (&
not simply expressing a general scepticism of the statement) I'll remove the last three words. |
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So, in brief*: put pig stem cells into humans in
utero or neonatally, so that they will tolerate
donor organs from clonal pigs in adult life. Yes? |
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Not a bad idea. Howevertheless, it'll face huge
issues being approved. I suspect that it will be
even harder because it would need to be done to
healthy fetuses or neonates - i.e. it meets a
potential rather than existing clinical need. |
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Then again, it's very clear that medical technology
is going to outstrip regulatory approval more and
more over the coming decades. There will be a
growing trend for people to educate themselves
and take medical decisions regardless of the
regulatory environment. |
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*Beware of vernonization. Keep the distance
between the first and last sentences as small as
possible. |
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//Beware of vernonization// Made me laugh. |
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//Oh no. Now ya done it. Gone and opened the
religion can of worms// |
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Just responding to a valid question :) |
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Any new tech (especially in medical fields) needs to
consider the moral ethical & religious sensitivities of
the prospective customers. |
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// Any new tech (especially in medical fields)
needs to consider the moral ethical & religious
sensitivities of the prospective customers.// |
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[Skewed], just trying to warn you. The mere speaketh
of the word religion in here can cost you hours of
defending your moral stance, if you chose to. I used
to, in 2001. Gave it up Lent. |
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//So, in brief*: put pig stem cells into humans in
utero or neonatally// |
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//it'll face huge issues being approved// |
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Unless that's a reference to something by Richard
Stern I'm confused? |
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As for keeping things concise, that I understand.
It's not always easy when your minds spinning
though :) |
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You will become familiar with the phenomenon that
is [vernon] sooner or later. |
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Vernonization is the tendency to use ten words
when none would do. |
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[MaxwellBuchanan], ah yes, now I see, already very
familiar with vernonization (just didn't have a label
for it). |
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Unfortunately I think I may actually be vernon (or
have been him in a prior life) :( |
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When it comes to pure research I would tend to
agree (exclusive of any funding issues that might
arise from the attitude of course). |
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But for any commercial development Id have to
disagree (not much point developing something
for the market if no one wants to buy it). |
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//I may actually be vernon (or have been him in a
prior life)// |
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That's very unlikely. Assuming that he types at a
normal speed, calculations reveal that he has been
in continuous existence for at least 158,000 years. |
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Of course, he still finds time to punctuate. |
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//not much point developing something for the
market if no one wants to buy it// |
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With the possible exception of vegetarian
sausages,
morality very rarely has any impact on market
penetration. If you can devise an effective anti-
wrinkle cream that depends on cells harvested
from
the pituitary glands of baby pandas, you'll sell all
you
can make. |
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For example, the second largest export market for
Melton Mowbray pork pies is Azerbaijan, which is
reportedly over 99% muslim. |
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//That's very unlikely. Assuming that he types at a
normal speed, calculations reveal that he has been
in continuous existence for at least 158,000
years.// |
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Ah, here I have to rely on Pratchett. |
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"Everything that happens happens. Everything
that in happening causes itself to happen again
happens again. But not necessarily in chronological
order." |
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Paraphrased of course, & doubtless he took it from
elsewhere. |
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In other words reincarnation doesnt necessarily
happen in order, you can be before you were, or
at the same time :) |
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Ah, but [vernon] is, as far as we are aware, still alive.
The odds of there being one [vernon] on an
inhabited planet are minuscule. The odds of there
being two are microscule. |
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//The odds of there being two are microscule.// |
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Not a million to one by any chance? |
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Because going back to Pratchett that would make it
a dead cert. Of course if hes been around that long
presumably hes bred, so maybe Im just related. |
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The odds of Pratchett being correct on statistical
matters are a million to one. |
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//I think humanity is moving away from animal
exploitation rather than towards// |
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[The porpoise], I disagree. |
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With modern developments in genetics & cell
biology the emphasis is shifting from the macro (or
whole) animal exploitation, but in many ways it
just disguises the continuing use of animals (take
the spider silk goat for instance). Besides, well
never stop eating meat or wearing leather
(regardless of what Roddenberry (the father of
Star Trek) might have thought or a minority may
espouse). Biologically we're natural omnivores &
always will be (if that changed wed have evolved
into a new species). |
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//The odds of Pratchett being correct on statistical
matters are a million to one.// |
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//I think humanity is moving away from animal
exploitation rather than towards// |
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I also disagree. Biology is the new silicon chip. |
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You're recommending that a single herd of pigs be
used for everyone? I assume that because of the
number of pigs you'd need otherwise. |
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Do you see a slight possible problem with there
being a genetic sequence/cell markers that every
single human on the planet (or even a large
percentage) treats as native rather than a foreign
invader? Yes, it's possible, even probable, that no
virus or bacteria will pick up the genes by lateral
transfer or random mutation, but the results if
one did don't justify the risk. |
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// transplants of their organs (a completely fruitless avenue of research) |
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1) I am relieved to find out the early "Howabout replacing Mr X's diseased heart with a mango?" phase of experimentation has passed. |
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2) Would it not be an idea to plant some fruit trees along the avenues near the [biological research place] and then they'd have to say something else, and have a source of nutritious fruit to hand? |
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//You're recommending that a single herd of pigs
be used for everyone?// |
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Only in the sense they would all be clones of the
same animal. |
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For various reasons several geographically separate
herds should be maintained. You don't want to
lose the lot in one go if disease
(or a meteor) struck your only herd of organ
transplant pigs. |
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Is herd the correct word to describe a group of pigs? |
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I was thinking of tidying this up a bit, but before I
do I just want to check on accepted etiquette re
pruning & editing extant copy. |
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There are bits in the original post that add nothing
to the core proposal & can be lost (musings on
non-hermaphrodite
actresses for one & anything to do with
approaches to adapting animal organs to be
less prone to tissue rejection for another). Aside
from that only those off topic posts making
exclusive mention of Vernon or Pratchett (mostly
mine, well, mostly half mine) immediately spring to
mind as possible pruning victims. |
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Ill be of screen for about a day (at least) so Ill
check back for responses to this & do it after Ive
read them (if at all). |
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A pokey of pigs is what we call them around the Mid-
West, USA. (lie, blatant lie alert!) |
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//The NRA will be pleased// |
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//Half the fun// //is seeing how long an idea goes
before descending into rants about religion or gun
control// |
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Which is why you poked the sleeping bear?
:) |
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I was only really thinking of tidying the idea up. I
have to agree its overly long poorly presented (&
yes, badly punctuated). The only posts I was half
thinking of trimming were maybe the last couple
or three regarding Vernon after [Max] had defined
him for me. |
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[Max] defining [Vernon] would be an idea in and of
itself, me thinks. |
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//Only in the sense they would all be clones of the
same animal. // |
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Which doesn't answer my basic safety concern. I
repeat that poking a uniform hole in everyone's
immune system seems like a bad idea. |
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//poking a uniform hole in everyone's immune
system seems like a bad idea// They said that about
the Giant Carnivorous Hybrid Capybara project*.
Only
one way to find out. |
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[Skewed], while I understand the urge to tidy and edit for flow, etc., there are some here who delete annos for reasons other than those. I recommend against deleting annos in general unless they are personal attacks or worse. |
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In the end it's your call but pixels are cheap, and in a format like this where any member can append an opinion it's probably only going to frustrate you if you hope to prune this into an idea bonzai. |
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[*and they were wrong, of course. The Giant
Carnivorous Hybrid Capybaras are thriving.] |
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//Which doesn't answer my basic safety concern// |
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[MechE], sorry, youre right, it doesnt, I hadnt
slept for about two days when you posted so my
attempted response was very incoherent (even for
me) & its a reasonable question many would ask
so I really did want the answer to make sense, so I
put it off, I really should have got back to you on
this before
now. |
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If you were on at the time last night you might
have seen me post, edit & delete two answers in
quick succession. |
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Changed my mind about what you were asking,
changed it back, decided everything Id said in
both replies was irrelevant to your question or
garbage (or both), gave it up as a bad job &
went to look at other threads. |
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Which all leads me to suggest a beer on top of
forty-eight hours of sleep deprivation maybe isnt
the best way of stimulating any form of cogent
thought. |
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Ive only had around five hours sleep since so I
doubt Ill do much better now, but anyway. |
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I looked into the question four years ago when I
first had this idea & dismissed it so thoroughly in
my own mind as a concern that (not having
thought about it since) Ive forgotten most (if not
all) of the reasons why. |
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Ill have a bash at it now (though Im thinking
[Max] is probably better qualified to field this
one, if his profile can be believed?). |
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Well what are we doing, adding a cell (the pigs)
that the organism (the foetus) will accept as its
own. |
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So how does the immune system recognise its
own cells, it cant read the DNA, thats buried in
the middle of the cell so it cant get to it, so it
must recognise cell walls, protein markers or cell
products expressed in the cell wall or released
from it. |
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The immune system is also demonstrably
programmable so presumably it builds up some kind
of pattern recognition when it first comes on line. |
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It cant rely an a single protein marker (or
whatever) for each tissue type as a key to tell it a
cells friendly or the viruses & bacteria would have
stumbled across all of them long ago, so its a lot
more than that. |
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Now viruses arent cells theyre strands of free
swimming DNA, so they cant mimic whatever the
immune system is using to recognise its own (no
cell wall etc). |
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Bacteria already have their own distinctive cell
walls & protein markers. If they could slough it off
& replace it with the pigs they wouldnt be
bacteria, theyd be viruses. |
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What a virus can do is hide away inside a cell, but
they can do that with a human cell anyway so
wheres the increased risk (the immune system
mostly gets them when theyre migrating to new
cells or target the cells they occupy when they
start producing proteins (DNA strands etc) they
shouldnt, & whether in a pig cell or a human cell
the triggers the immune system is responding to
will be the same). |
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Sorry if Ive not made it overly clear, still not
feeling totally chipper. |
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If Ive made any major errors that anyone who
actually has training in the area has spotted Id be
grateful to have them pointed out & corrected. |
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Ive added a couple of links that may help show
how complex the tissue typing can be. |
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//Now viruses arent cells theyre strands of free
swimming DNA, so they cant mimic whatever the
immune system is using to recognise its own (no
cell wall etc). // |
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They aren't exactly free swimming DNA, they have
a nice little thing called the capsid, which is a
protein shell. While not quite the same as the
cell wall, if the virus mimics an accepted protein
structure, that's going to cause problems. And
contrary to your statement, I would suggest
that a single (or very narrow range of) protein
would be
sufficient, and the reason virii haven't adapted
is because it is different for every person (not
quite every, but enough variation exists). |
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As far as bacteria, no, they can't adapt en masse,
but a single protein in common is going to be a
survival advantage in that host (slight decrease in
the chance of attack if the particular Dendritic
cell keys to the particular protein). If it is a
survival advantage in all hosts, then the
adaptation will be extremely rapid. So you have
one protein in common, and lots more mutation
going on. Want to bet how quickly it can get
close enough that the body can't tell the
difference? |
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And this ignores the issue of lateral DNA transfer
in both virii and bacteria. |
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Hmm - that then could well be a problem with all
your
clone herds based on a single cloned individual. |
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Your sure about single (or very narrow range of)
protein.... scrub that, of course you are. |
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In that case we'd have to spread the load over
several cell lines. any suggestion on how many would
be safe? |
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//Want to bet how quickly it can get close enough
that the body can't tell the difference?// |
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Considering how fast the suckers breed I wouldn't be
surprised by days, or less. |
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Yeast re-working own DNA in situ in a very stressed environment. |
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Damned if I can find the news story, think it was one of Helen Causton's papers. |
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I'd just like to say wow, the first genetic
engineering
idea I've read here that is truly bun-worthy, not
written by [beanangel], and not dismissed as GM
magic. |
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The pedants might point out that the word you're
looking for is affected, not effected. Affect is the
verb. |
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For a good intro to the bakery, look up [krelnik]'s
guide for newbies, read anything written by
[Farmerjohn] or [lostdog] or [bristolz]. And you've
clearly done your homework by quoting Pratchett. |
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//And this ignores the issue of lateral DNA transfer
in both virii and bacteria.// |
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Ah now here you're talking about transgenic
viruses & this providing additional opportunities
for pig diseases to pick up a few genes by lateral
transfer. |
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If you're right about single (or very narrow range
of) protein keys that really is a problem for a single
cell line clone herd, though hopefully fixable by
using multiple herds each of a different cell line. |
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But this is different, transgenic viruses hop the
species barrier all the time & we deal with them
(with greater or lesser success granted). Its
simply an issue of good practice (herd hygiene &
regular disease testing) & one of the reasons
youd keep multiple geographically isolated herds,
obviously more rigorous than anything used for
food stock & up to speck for medical purposes
(each animal tested & screened before use etc),
but this I cant see as anything new that we dont
already face one way or another & that cant be
managed with adequate regulatory & quality
control. |
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//Yeast re-working own DNA in situ in a very
stressed environment.// |
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[not morrison] Tried dumping the whole lot into
Google as read, it sent me to a page with an opening
line that reads "I have recently completed
2 stool sample tests" |
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I really hope that wasn't what you were looking for :) |
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So... the questions then become; do we really want our kids to be Guinea-pigs? or Long-Pork?, or even fewer degrees separated from Kevin Bacon than they already now are? |
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Would they want that? Would you ever wish your parents had let people do that to you? Will we be able to make a silk purse form a human ear? Would we be tastier? |
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There're just so many questions. |
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Nah - I'd use real Guinea-pigs (probably taste
better). |
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Mr. bacon's begun to look a bit shifty in those
adverts - so the further away the better :) |
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Havent asked them yet could take a while to
get a response though (they need to be conceived
first). |
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A bit tangential isnt it? I can honestly say I
hadn't considered
the benefits of silkworm DNA (but if thats what
you want) we can make a spider silk goat so
I don't see why not? |
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Shouldn't think so apparently we taste like pork
already, but saltier (so a little less salty perhaps?) |
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Thanks for the feedback on pruning guys, decided
to leave it as is & just edit the odd bit of spelling
or punctuation. |
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//Don't think of the HB as a patent application // |
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[bigsleep] Patent application? I actually posted this
to get holes poked in it, couldnt believe I might
have actually thought of something but couldn't
find any flaws in the basic idea ;P |
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If you want the honest truth I first came up with
this idea as spin off from character development
for a mad scientist with an ongoing super soldier
project that I was writing up for a cross over
vampire /
mage game. |
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Quickly convinced myself it would really work &
was stunned to find no mention of any research or
even a paper on the potential when I looked. |
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Still looking & still not found, maybe Im using the
wrong search parameters? |
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//just don't reply to the trolls// |
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But I like trolls! Theyre cute & dribble such nice
green gook :) |
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[RayfordSteele], thanks, I'll look at them later. |
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//Don't think of the HB as a patent application // |
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Its not an idea you can patent anyway, all the
material used is material already in the public
domain, its a technique & you cant patent them
any more than you can a business model or go
down to the ministry of silly walks & patent your
very own silly walk. |
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"Why Can't I Patent a Discovery I Made?
Even if you make a new and useful scientific
discovery that no one else has ever thought of,
you cannot get a patent on it because you did not
actually create the fact you discovered. That fact
was always in existence, you were just the first to
notice it. However, if you can come up with an
invention that makes use of that fact, you can
patent the invention." |
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"Question: What cannot be patented?
Answer:
· Laws of nature
· Physical phenomena
· Abstract ideas" |
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If it is a new idea & ever got used it'd still be nice
to get a credit somewhere for coming up with it -
Ive
never had an original thought before, still not sure
I have :) |
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Assuming it doesn't all go horribly wrong of course,
in
which case I had nothing to do with it ;P |
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// its a technique & you cant patent them any
more than you can a business model or go down to
the ministry of silly walks & patent your very own
silly walk// |
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Not necessarily so. There are various classes of
patent (at least in Europe/UK - not sure about US
but I think so), including process patents. I think
they're harder to defend than other classes, but
they exist. |
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[Maxwell], unfortunately for me a process
patent needs you to show the process is workable
by testing it. |
|
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Assuming animal trials are acceptable that needs a
lab with appropriate equipment & several acres for
your test subjects (I couldnt be doing with mice,
theyre just so fiddly). |
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I could maybe scratch up £6,000 at a stretch &
have no formal (& precious little informal)
education or hands on experience
in appropriate fields (so a backer is unlikely). |
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Plus as you said they're not overly easy to defend.
On top of that I think current UK legislation would
make
its use illegal (so theres no profit to be had in it
without first securing legislative change) |
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So how hard would be to infect a large number of
people with cancerous pig cells? Of course it might
be mitigated somewhat because everyone infected
would have the same cancer and a well targeted
treatment could be developed probably before too
many people died. |
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Welcome and [+] by the way. It's definitely an
interesting idea. |
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[scad mientist], Your thinking of the kind of
problem they're having with the Tasmanian devil
are you? |
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Sounds like a reason for multiple geographically
isolated herds & not transporting animals between
them. |
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|
The first step is slaughter any infected
herd (bacon sandwich anyone?) & choose some
rigorously screened animals from the remaining
herds to start breeding up a replacement for it.
That stops further infection from source. |
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After that you just treat those infected in the
same way as for any other cancer. Of course as the
cancer in question is propagating from a separate
genetic cell line than that of the host
treatment is relatively easy. You use gene therapy
&
targeted drug therapy to kill the pig cells
(already in clinical use if memory
serves). |
|
|
Theres no reason the infection should have
spread from the original foetal stem cell injections
(they should have been produced from lab grown
cell lines that had been verified clear of any kind
of problem like this) but if it did bin the stem cell
line, use medical birth records to identify
everyone else inoculated from it (so you catch
them before they even experience any symptoms)
& use the same treatment. |
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It shouldn't have come from infected implant
organs either (they should have been screened),
its a tad more difficult if it did, kill
the pig cells & you kill the organ, so youll need
a dialyses machine (or what's appropriate to
the organ) to take over its function while the
cells are
killed, then you replace it with one from a
properly screened animal from a clean herd. And
then go home (stopping at a lawyers on the way to
instigate medical malpractice proceedings for
failing to screen the original organ before use). |
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If it does come from implant organs only a small
number of people should be affected before its
spotted. |
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//I am relieved to find out the early "Howabout
replacing Mr X's diseased heart with a mango?"
phase of experimentation has passed.// |
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|
[not_Morrison_rm], I thought it had, but recent
surfing disabuses me of the notion. Apparently the
artificial alternatives havent lived up to
expectations so its picking up again. Theres
mention on some of the links, but it doesn't
look
like they ever expect to do it
without a lifelong course of anti rejection
drugs. |
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|
Personally I think theyve got it arse about face, a
bit like someone not reading the instructions &
taking a suppository aurally. |
|
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[bigsleep], Optical Character Definition therapy? |
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|
Actually, if you were going to do this, you'd probably
want to engineer your pigs to have a unique drug
susceptibility so that, if needs be, you could zap
them easily. |
|
|
Sounds like one of the easier genetic twists to
perform from what I read. |
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|
[scad_mientist], your question has suggested an
alternative deluxe package to me. Duplicate
everything with sheep. Then loving parents with
enough coin can buy their as yet unborn foetus
inoculation for both sheep & pig transplants. So if
they do ever need the pig cells eradicated they can
just swap their pig organs for sheeps' & its
outpatient all the way for the pig cell eradication
treatment :D |
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|
//one of the easier genetic twists to perform// |
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Yes. There's a bunch of selectable markers (both
positive and negative) for eukaryotic cells. |
|
|
Actually another method just occurred,
production of antibodies to attack the offending
pig cells can be stimulated in a another animal (a
pig with a different tissue type perhaps) by
introducing small amounts of the offending cells. |
|
|
Harvest these & inject them. |
|
|
You dont want any antibodies mixed in that
attack the human cells & you dont want the
human immune system attacking the antibodies,
so the pig growing them will
be transgenic, which means the virulence of the
cancer & the time frame you have for treatment
are factors. |
|
|
Treat pig foetus with the patients cells, after its
born, a bone marrow transplant from patient
to piglet (while its small so you dont need a lot). |
|
|
Let it grow to an adequate size to be able to draw
sufficient quantities of blood & you can start. |
|
|
Whats that, a four month turn around say? |
|
|
You really don't want to use non-human antibodies
as therapeutics if you can avoid it. They illicit their
own immune response. |
|
|
You should really use humanized antibodies (ie,
antibodies raised initially in rats, mice or whatever;
then engineered to be more like human antibodies
whilst retaining the specificity of the original),
because (a) they work a lot better and (b) the
royalties keep me in Jaguars. |
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|
An awful lot of effort, the drug susceptibility is
faster & better, you can even have it stockpiled. |
|
|
But you only need one humanized antibody. They
too can be stockpiled. |
|
|
Or your antibodies then :) |
|
|
//You really don't want to use non-human
antibodies as therapeutics if you can avoid it.
They illicit their own immune response.// |
|
|
But they're human antibodies, you won't even
need to harvest them from the blood, you can
transfuse it directly :) |
|
|
//Treat pig foetus with the patients cells, after
its born, a bone marrow transplant from patient
to piglet (while its small so you dont need a
lot).// |
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|
It's rather unnecessary & time consuming though
when there are methods that can be stockpiled. |
|
|
Came up with that on the fly, was thinking too
fast & skipping steps, the piglets dead before it
gets to any reasonable size. |
|
|
By replacing it's bone marrow with the patients
own you've just created a pig who's own immune
system will kill it, the bone marrow transplant also
makes the foetal stem cell injection step surplus
to requirements. |
|
|
Drug susceptibility & your humanized antibodies it
is then. :) |
|
|
[MechE], MHC II aside (see The Immune System
link) I find we have a pattern of only six protein
markers that tell the immune system a cell
belongs. |
|
|
So its not inconceivable a bacteria or virus might
stumble on a single combination. |
|
|
On top of that the number of possible
combinations (with 200 known protein markers)
itself suggests this variation is a significant
element of the immune system on a macro or
species (rather than individual) level. |
|
|
So Im dropping the one clone pig for all bit. |
|
|
Theres no point keeping a clone line for each pig
tissue type, so in the revised plan we maintain
stem cell lines in the lab for each pig tissue type
accept the rarest & keep a record of how many are
inoculated from each so we can make sure to
spread the inoculations evenly between them. |
|
|
The transplant herds remain much the same but
now dont involve any cloning, you just keep a
tissue type register of all the animals to insure you
have enough of each type to meet projected
demand (some standard cloning might be in order
to boost numbers if stocks of one tissue type was
a little low). |
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|
Baked before me [linky], it's taken me four bleedin years to
find this :) |
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|
new [link] from 2014 (from about 6 months after this), seems
barring the ethics committee it's a go, so that won't happen
then. |
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