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Repairing Genetic Mutations With Lasers?

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the shed-a-little-light-on-your-genes dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "German researchers at the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel (CAU) think they've proved that genetic information can be controlled by light. The group studied the interaction between the four DNA bases — adenine (A), cytosine (C), guanine (G), and thymine (T) — by using femtosecond time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy. The researchers think that they've demonstrated that DNA strands differ in their light sensitivity depending on their base sequences. The team thinks that it might be possible in the future to repair gene mutations using laser radiation. One of the project leaders said that 'it might even be possible under some circumstances to make transistors from DNA that would work through the hydrogen bonds.' It's not the first time I've heard about DNA computing, but this new approach looks promising."

7 of 65 comments (clear)

  1. woohoo! by db32 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Eugenics here we come!

    I have a wonderfully hilarious image of fundamentalists chasing homosexuals around with flashlights because they read the dumbed down Fox friendly version of this story.

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    The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
    1. Re:woohoo! by AdmiralXyz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Does anyone else find it a really disturbing sign of the times that the parent was modded Insightful, not Funny?

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    2. Re:woohoo! by db32 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I find it terribly disturbing and I am the poster!

      Though, to be serious, this type of science inevitably comes down to "cure those who are different".

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      The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
    3. Re:woohoo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      In the defense of this, many times this being "different" is a severe biological inconvenience, and many people would like to be cured.

  2. Misleading headline by robinsonne · · Score: 5, Insightful

    From reading TFA, the researchers have seen that different bases will fluoresce different lengths of time when they shoot a laser at them. I can see where it might help with sequencing (as is mentioned in TFA) by recognizing the presumably fast glow pattern, but anything beyond that is plain wishful thinking on the part of the writer.

    One might also envisage linking the photophysical properties to genetic characteristics. When these mechanisms are better understood, it might in the long term become possible to repair gene mutations using laser radiation.

    I can imagine breeding flying pigs too, but I don't see it happening anytime soon either.

    1. Re:Misleading headline by Rutulian · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Forget about the cell biology. What about the chemistry and physics? How can laser light change a base pair? Radiation can induce mutations because it can, among other things, promote photochemical reactions that make bases or base pairs unrecognizable to the cell machinery. As a result, polymerases introduce mismatched bases when replicating a sequence. I cannot think of any possible way of directly converting, say, a thymidine to a cytidine by irradiating it. Doesn't mean it's not possible, but certainly isn't something that's going to be on the table anytime soon.

  3. Re:Laser radiation? by Wizard+Drongo · · Score: 2, Insightful

    And what "LASER" stands for has just gone flying over your head at the, well the speed of Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation.

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    The truth shall always be free: Boris Floricic is Tron.