Does genetic engineering take affect immediately or is it a slow process?

Question

and how far off are we from being able to use it on our bodies to cure diseases and health?

Answer 1

Now that they have banned stem cell research in the U.S., we are falling further behind. Genetic engineering is tricky, but men have been using it with plants for centuries, before we even understood the existence of genes.

When you say genetic engineering are you referring to say, genetic therapy. Where they introduce new cells in to the human body, to try and out breed the existing mutated cells? Or are you talking about creating a whole person in a tube? I would have to say it has been a slow on going process. VERY SLOW.

We can now, select good gene carrying cells to produce the healthiest baby a human couple can produce, and fertilize the female artificially. It is not full proof and there are still some genes we can not recognize or do anything about.

Anyway good luck and take care

Answer 2

Genetic engineering can take a long time or a short period of time. It depends on what you want to do. For example engineering tomatoes so that they don't ripen until they are exposed to a certain gas is instantanious. The tomatoes they create will automatically show that characteristic.

And as for how far we are from genetically modifying our bodies, we could be close but there is alot of controversy onto whether or not we should be aloud to do this. Right now it's illegal to genetically engineer human beings, say to change a phyiscal characteristic of a fetus, i believe (I may be wrong).

Answer 3

Genetic engineering is a human-driven process based off of the concept of modifying organisms (anything from tiny bacteria to humans) to suit need. If you want bacteria to eat away at some poison in an area, but there's also a lot of competing bacteria, you can genetically engineer your eating bacteria to be immune to an antibiotic and then flood the region with the antibiotic. The eating bacteria will live, the others will die.

Similiarly, if you have a human with a genetic disease and you want to keep them from dying or expressing symptoms, you can engineer a virus to insert DNA into their cells to correct the problem.

Answer 4

Many rersaeaches are going on to provide genetic cures to many diseases. Bit it takes time.

Answer 5

I think you are confusing genetic engineering with Gene Therapy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_therapy

Answer 6

It really depends on what you want to do. There are real limits on that topic, but it is good for medical purposes.

Answer 7

We can currently use it, but some people find certain things that could be helpful unethical.