By DPA
Singapore : Scientists eager to splice human genes with animal cells are seeking public feedback on the prospect of such controversial research, a news report said Wednesday.
As Singapore moves into performing clinical trials for drugs, research in this field could prove to be a boon for scientists,” The Straits Times quoted Lim Pin, chairman of the Bioethics Advisory Committee (BAC), as saying.
Those favouring such research maintain it could be vital to finding cures to many human diseases. Mice with human brain cells could be used as test beds for Parkinson’s disease or Alzheimer’s disease, they said.
The city-state, with its ambitions to become a global bio-medical powerhouse, has the technology to create these “mixed animals” that can be created by infusing a human nucleus, the cell’s nerve centre, with an animal egg or cell, Lim said.
Most countries prohibit so-called chimera research, although a parliamentary bill is up for discussion in Britain.
“Science in the distant future may even allow us to grow human organs in animals for transplants,” Lim told the newspaper.
Websites against such research say scientists would be playing God by creating half-human, half-animal monstrosities.
“Scientists are not asking to make a half-man, half-horse creature,” said Lee Hin Peng, the BAC’s deputy chairman.
The research would likely involve only small amounts of human genetic tissue combined with distantly related animals such as rats or mice, he said.
The BAC, the country’s research ethics watchdog, is inviting feedback online at www.reach.gov.sg and hopes to reach a decision by the end of this year.