Sunday, March 20, 2011
No Luck With Ask A Scientist
On the ask a scientist website I asked, How do scientists keep the body from becoming immune to the viruses that are used as vectors for gene therapy. I received no answer from the ask a scientist website. When I researched this topic on line I found that they don't. One of the reasons that gene therapy has not been widely successful, is that the body does develop a defense against the viruses used for gene therapy. This makes it so that scientists have to use many different viruses for each round of gene therapy. This requires more resources, and a lot of time. This is a topic that I will continue to research and follow as scientists develop new and improved gene therapy techniques.
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Lori,
ReplyDeleteThanks for researching to find an answer to your question. It is a question that I have wondered about as well, especially because there are so many ways that scientists use viruses to help us. It is interesting that they don't keep the body from developing the immunity, but that they have to change what they are doing to stay ahead of the body's natural defenses. This again proves that the body is an amazing machine and very comples and self-sufficient.
Please keep us updated as you discover new things related to gene therapy.