Genetically modified microbes alert the immune system to cancer in mice

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/03/science/cancer-bacteria-immune-system.html

by sky_nox • 7 years ago

108 6 7 years ago

sddfd• 7 years ago

In before "genetically modified microbes induce auto immune disease in cancer patients".

ramraj07• 7 years ago

Not sure if you have genuine grounded concerns, but even if so, people might choose a life long autoimmune side effect than dying of cancer.

Has happened before where patients were okay with deadly side effects - F.D.A. Allows Some Patients to Resume M.S. Drug https://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/16/business/fda-allows-some-...

dang• 7 years ago

"Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Especially please don't do this when a thread is new. Threads are remarkably sensitive to initial conditions, and this is a kind of defacement.

sitharus• 7 years ago

This seems like a game-changing system, certainly for some tumours. I do wonder about the bacteria entering the wider environment though, but given it's a common bacteria I guess there's plenty of existing research in to that.

Makes me think of the studies showing how much of an effect your gut bacteria have on your health. Perhaps this could be harnessed to treat disease without the sledgehammers that are antibiotics.

Unfortunately I'm a software developer, not a biologist, so I know nothing about this. I'm sure smarter people are already working on it.

pythonwutang• 7 years ago

At some point in the future, we will use programmable bacteria for treatment

Will bacteria be “programmable” in the same way that a computer is?

Hard to believe so maybe that’s not the right word for it.

If it will be then we will, in a way, be monkey patching natural selection’s code.

Testing would also be a pain!

monocasa• 7 years ago

Will bacteria be “programmable” in the same way that a computer is?
Hard to believe so maybe that’s not the right word for it.

They already are.

https://media.ccc.de/v/24c3-2329-en-change_me

That's a video from 2007 talking about how high school student can program bacteria. It's gotten a couple orders of magnitude easier and cheaper in the past decade since that talk.

Genetically modified microbes alert the immune system to cancer in mice

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