Genetic Engineering In Medicine

Genetic Engineering is a process where we manually remove our gene of interest from an organism and insert it into another organism. This results in the organism possessing the particular trait we want from the organism. Applications of genetic engineering can be found all around us. They can range from certain crops that are pest resistant to the food with higher nutritional value and even to the medicine that we consume. Genetic engineering began in 1973 when Herb Boyer and Stanley Cohen created the first recombinant deoxyribonucleic (DNA) organism. They transferred antibiotic resistance genes into a plasmid. The plasmid was later introduced into Escherichia Coli. They then discovered that the following generations of daughter cells were also resistant to the antibiotics. In 1974, Rudolf Jaenisch created the first transgenic animal. After he introduced the foreign DNA into mice embryo, he observed that the foreign DNA was found in the mice tissue. This started the discovery of many more products that were produced from genetic engineering later on. The report features the medicine aspect in the application of genetic engineering.

This is how genetic engineering will be able to help us in producing those medical products. Now some patients will be able to have a certain chemical or hormone that they previously lack. The most common medical product developed from genetic engineering will be insulin. There are still many other products derived from genetic engineering. Other instances are human growth hormone, human albumin and monoclonal antibodies. These medical products can help to treat many diseases that were deemed incurable in the