alt Hacker NewsLipid nanoparticles are quite old as-is. How do you target cells specifically?
> If you get really good at delivery, you can destroy A LOT of cells very quickly.
You can destroy cells quickly. Ok. So the question is: how do you detect specifically only cancer cells via lipid nanoparticles? That was already a problem years ago with Herceptin. The rationale that is always used is that "we need to do something" for certain aggressive cancers. It has never been a super-effective technique, despite all the promo of how monoclonal antibodies are so accurate.
> As you "get good" at killing the target cells, the net effect can turn bad. It will probably be a balancing act.
That's already the status quo in the whole cancer field. I don't think that more than sloppy accuracy is acceptable for any gene therapy - and the off-target cleaving of CRISPR has always been the number #1 problem here.
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> So the question is: how do you detect specifically only cancer cells via lipid nanoparticles?
You don't. Healthy cells will also get these nanoparticles, but without the triggering DNA sequence, the mRNA payload will remain inert and eventually will be degraded.
> I don't think that more than sloppy accuracy is acceptable for any gene therapy
Valid critiques of Cas12a2 must acknowledge the mechanistic differences between Cas9 and Cas12a2. There is no research to suggest Cas12a2 is "sloppy" and significant research that demonstrates it is not "sloppy."
I appreciate the skepticism but I would encourage you to study the actual mechanism discussed in the paper.