Human-animal chimeras are organisms comprised of cells from two or more individuals of the same or different species. There are ethical concerns regarding developing chimeras that are too human. Researchers and institutes working on chimeras say concerns must be given to studies incorporating human neurons or gametes into primates. While chimeras could benefit medical research, critics argue it disregards animal welfare and could lead to uncertain outcomes. Regulations of chimeras vary by country with some banning it due to ethical controversies.

1. Human-Animal Chimeras
New Developments and Ethical
Issues

2. Chimeras
It is a reference to ancient
Greek mythology
A combination of goat, lion
and snake …

3. Chimeras are not Hybrids
-Chimeras are organisms comprised of
-cells from two or more individuals of
the same or different species .
-Hybrids : crossbreeding of two
-different species .
-- Human- animal hybrids is a wrong term .
-- Because the chimera contains cells from
two different genetic individuals , and
each of these arose by mating , it has four
parents , a hybrid has only two parents
.

4. The Importance of Animal Research
Every medical breakthrough
in the 20th century come
about as a result of research
with animals .

5. Chimeras , Transgenics , and
Xenotransplantation
• Chimeras : DNA is not mixed
• Transgenics : Human DNA is mixed with animal
or plant DNA
• Xenotransplantation : Human DNA might be mixed
with animal DNA

6. Transgenic Animals
• Started with the purpose of producing
better breed lines of farm animals .
• Moved forward in attempting to produce
important biopharmaceuticals , to that of
producing organs for humans .

7. Transgenic Animals
A transgenic animal is one
which has been genetically
altered to have a specific
characteristics it otherwise
would not have. In
animals transgenesis
either means transferring
DNA into the animal or
altering DNA already in
the animal .

10. Animal-Animal Chimeras
In the last 25 years , researchers especially
from University of Cornell , have worked with
these half-half creatures , like :
rabbit-tiger
goat-sheep
quail-chick
mouse-horse

11. Sheep-Goat Chimera
-First developed by Dr. R.S.White , Australia in
1978.
-- Researches fused a sheep embryo with a
goat embryo , the resulting creature was a
mosaic of goat and sheep tissue . The parts
that grew from the sheep embryo were wooly ,
those from the goat embryo were hairy .
-- This chimera may be fertile , but it passes on
either sheep or goat genes , depending on
whether its reproductive organs were formed
from the goat or sheep embryos .

12. Quail-Chick Chimera
-Nicole Le Douarin , Institute of Embryology ,France.
--By inserting quail cells of early stages into a chicken
egg.
-- The quail cells act as markers , to be easily identified
when they differentiate and form the chick.
-- By comparing the final product with where the cells
are originally implanted , researchers were able to
track how each muscle develops and where that tissue
originated . The goal was to shed light on the
development of higher animal nervous and immune
systems .
-She showed that procursor cells within the neural crest
were multipotent.

13. The Vacanti Mouse
-By Dr Charles Vacanti , University of
Massachusetts in 1995.
-- Like a human ear . Was an ear-shaped
cartilage structure grown by seeding cow
cartilage cells – no human tissue used .
-- Created to demonstrate a method of
fabricating cartilage structures for
transplantation into human patients , a
resonable polyester fabric was infiltrated
with bovine cartilage cells and implanted
under the skin of hairless mouse .
-- The picture still provoke controversy .

15. Human Pluripotent Stem Cells
• hPSCs capable of turning into any kind of tissue
and stem cells .
• hPSCs , theoretically provide an indefinitely
renewable source of any kind of human tissue,
thus offering tremendous potential for basic
research , drug development and regenerative
medicine .
• The first sources of hPSCs were human embryos .

16. How To Examine hPSCs
• The standard method to test that hPSCs are
truly pluripotent is to inject them into postnatal
immune-deficient mice , and see whether they
give rise to teratomas ( tumors that consist of
disorganized tissue gowth of the three embryonic
germ layers : endoderm , mesoderm , and
ectoderm )

17. Human-sheep
chimera
-By Dr. Esmail Zanjani
university of Nevada.
-This research is going for
the last 2 years and still.
-- Sheep contain 15%
human genes ,body of
sheep but organs that are
partly human.
-Goal is to have partly
human liver , lungs, heart
and brain for human
transplants.

18. Human-monkey chimera
- Dr Eugene Redmond , Yale University .
-Implanting several millions of human neural cells
(from stem cells )into the brain of an African green
monkey .
-- When the human cell mature they function as
living partners with the billions of monkey brain cells
that are already there.
-- Researchers putting 8-10 million human cells in a
monkey brain that may has 20-40 billion cells.
-- The goal is that will help supply a chemical called
dopamine , which is missing from the brains of
people who have Parkinson’s disease.

19. Human-Animal Chimeras for Vaccines
• - The field of vaccines for diseases such as
• (HIV) has faced major failures in recent years .
• - Diseases like malaria ,HIV , hepatitis C and dengue
cause high morbidity and mortality in the
developing world as compared to the developed
world .

20. diseases
• - Viral infections caused by hepatitis B virus ,
hepatitis C and HIV , affect more than 500 million
people resulting in more than 3.5 million
deaths/year .
• - Bacterial and parasitic diseases have a similarity
high impact . Endemic and epidemic malaria result
in severe disease in about half-a-billion people each
year , and causes 1.5 million deaths annually ,
mostly in developing countries .

21. Humanized Mice
• - Have recently emerged as powerful tools in the
investigation of human diseases .
• - Models transplanted with human cells or tissues
and/or human transgenes that are suited for direct
investigation of human infections agents .
• - Recent researches focus on HBV, HCV, HIV, TB, and
malaria , with mice carrying the target tissues of
human pathogens , as well as bearing human
immune components to react against them.

23. Examples of Humanized Mice
HIS Mice
• - (HIS) human immune system mice .
• - Are generated by grafting immune-deficient
animals with suspensions of hematopoietic cells
and/or human peripheral blood cells with
supplemental human tissues supporting the
generation of human immune cells.
• - HIS mice are already showing potential as the
only available small animal model for HIV infection
,for testing the efficacy of antiviral compounds.

25. Ethical Issues

26. Chimeras Debate
• There are legitimate ethical questions
related to chimeras
• At the same time The main health
benefits of chimeras may occur in the
developing world .

27. In The Developed Countries
• There is a strong vocal political opposition
against chimeras in the west .
• Xenotransplantation and transgenic
animals for drugs and disease models
have not faced such opposition .

28. Rotavirus Vaccine Case
• In general ,there is a precedence of delays in the
development of life-saving technologies when
the perspective of communities in developing
countries is not taken into account .
• Example : An earlier version of the rotavirus
vaccine was removed from the market in the US
in 1999, when few children developed negative
symptoms which postponed research and
subsequent introduction of rotavirus vaccine in
developing countries ,where hundreds of
thousands of children die every year from
rotavirus associated diarrhea.

29. Risk and Benefits
Some health officials in the developing
countries argue , that even though there
was a small risk of negative effects in
some children getting the vaccine , the
benefits of testing the vaccine in
developing countries , given the disease
burden , far outweighed the risk .

30. Public Controversy
Examples Of Public Media Headlines
* Scientists create animals that are part-human .
* the biological co-mingling of animal and human.
* What if a human mind somehow got trapped
inside a sheep’s head .
* Harvesting human organs from sheep .
* Combining monkeys and people .
* Researches were attempting to play god ?
* Human born to mice parents ! ( national geog.)
* Mice with human brains .

31. The latest legislations in some developed
countries
• May 2008 : The UK House of Commons , decided
that embryos would allowed to be made in
laboratories only if guarantees of destroying them
within the first 14 days were given.
• Jun2008 : Government of UK approved and granted
a Newcastle University a permit to use cow eggs
filled with human DNA to develop therapies for
Parkinson’s disease and stroke victims ( all cow
DNA would be removed before the human DNA
would be inserted )

32. Legislation
• 2009 : Canada bans all chimera research .
• 2009 : The human-animal hybrid prohibition Act.
Failed to pass the US Congress.
• June 2010 : In US , some States banned chimera
research – Ohio-Oklahoma-Louisiana and Arizona.
• Feburary 2009 : US (FDA) ,announced approval of
Atryn , an anticoagulant protein derived from the
milk of transgenic goats , (first time) , it was
approved in Europe before that .

33. Chimeras Ethical Issues
Summary
The main concern is : will
chimeras eventually be developed
to be too human .

34. Chimeras Ethical Issues
Bioethics , researchers , animal rights
activists ,and others interested in chimeras
can be divided in two broad categories :
1- Complete opposition to research of
chimeras .
2- Concerns about particular research
methods to be used , and outcomes
that may result .

35. The group who are convinced
that human-animal chimera
should not performed at all .
Because :
• It involves research on human embryos
combining human and animal genetic material.
• Because it disregards the welfare of animals
and animal species involved , especially the
higher primates (Chimpanzees) .

36. The other group , not
completely opposed to the
research , their concerns :
•Could chimeras have human brains ?
•What is the potential for humanized
chimeras
•How will human-animal primate
chimeras be treated .

37. What are the scientists
opinions on human-animal
chimeras
•A concern must given to studies in which human
neurons or gametes might be incorporated into the
brain or gonads of a closely related primate.
*The permeability of the boundary between species
• Proposed research for chimeras must have
scientific merit ,be directed to increase the
knowledge and potential public benefit in
appropriate facilities with properly trained and
supported scientists and stuff.

38. Scientists opinions …….
• Chimeras are designed to have an immune system
through the use of hESCs, which may allow for
transgression of species boundaries .
• What would happen if human cells migrated to the
central nervous system of a chimera and make
connections with the animal’s neurons?
• The possibility of breeding generations of human-
animal chimeras and the uncertainty of the nature
of the offspring .
•

39. What researchers and research institutes
working on human-animal chimeras say:
• Having only a few non-human cells in the final
individual would not suffice since a human with a
porcine heart valve is still a human being . But
where to draw the line is unclear ,even for
researchers .
• The moral confusion argument has been alleged to
be at the heart of the public controversy ,but this
allegation is not supported by the extensive social
science research on public understanding and
attitudes toward modern biotechnology.

40. Thank
you

41. Biosafety in Food and
Agriculture
Tarek
Alfallah

42. Between the 60’s & 90’s
 Milk yield in most dairy cow breeds
have been more than doubled
 Time needed to produce a slaughter-
weight broiler fell from 40 to 80 days.

43. These achievements derive, and
still increasing
1. improved management practices:
 Record keeping
 Breed societies
 Facilities & equipments
 Computer skills
2. measurements of the genetic potential
 Heritability's of different traits
 Selection
 Advanced biometric models

44. Status of Genetically Modified
GM crop Tech in Africa
Commercial production : Burkina Faso , Egypt and S.F
Confined field testing : Burkina Faso , Egypt , South
Africa , Kenya , Uganda , Nigeria .
Contained research : at least 14 countries .

45. Genetic Progress For
Quantitative Traits
 Made by selection on phenotype or on
estimated breeding values (EBV)
 Without knowledge of the number of
genes that affect the trait or the effects
of each gene.
 Hundreds of genes may affect one
quantitative trait .

46.  Molecular genetics
allows for the study
the genetic make-up of
individuals at the DNA
level .

47. TWO BIG DIFFERENCES
Traditional Genetic
Breeding Methods Modification
 Require several  Progress can be
generations to achieved
produce beneficial in one generation .
traits .
 More precise ,
 Transfers all the transfer only
animal’s genes ( good desirable genes .
and bad ) to the next
generation .

48. Molecular genetics either by
 Direct selection on genes that affect
traits of interest , major genes or
quantitative trait loci ( QTL ) .
 Selection on genetic markers linked
to QTL .

49. Why molecular genetic information can
result in greater gain than phenotypic
information ?
 Not affected by environmental effects and ,therefore,
has heritability equal to 1.
 Can be available at an early age in principle at the
embryo stage , thereby allowing early selection and
reduction of generation interval .
 Can be obtained on all selection traits especially :
- sex-linked traits
- Expensive or difficult to record
- Traits that require slaughter of the
animal ( carcass traits )

50. One good reason to use new
biotechnologies
 It ‘s been estimated that the supply
of food required to adequately meet
human nutritional needs over the
next 40 years is equal to the
amount of food previously produced
throughout the entire history of
humankind .

51. Reproductive
technology Genetic
modification
transgenics
Cloning
Pharmaceut-
ical farm
Selection &
Animals
culling
Mating

52. BIOSAFETY
Protecting human and animal health and
Environment from the possible adverse
Effects of products of modern biotechnology

53. Four main events in the last
40 years
The United Nations conference on the human
environment and development .( 1972)
The Rio Earth Summit ( 1992)
Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) 1992
Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (CPB) 1993

54. Biosafety issues of transgenic
crops ( genetic pollution)
1- Laboratory green house stage
2- Confined trial stage
New genotypes
gene flow or spreading by pollen grains or
Other ways ; means genetically polluted the wild
Type plant in the area ……

55. Risks of genetic pollution
 GMO’s enter the food chain
 The risk of loosing the wild type relatives of
the transgenics ( the natural reserve of
plant)
 Global warming and genotype –environment
interaction

56. CONCL. & RECOM……….
 Biotechnology in food and agriculture already
put its prints on the industry .
 Biotechnology is needed to the developing
countries for their food security and health
now and in the future .
 Modern biotechnology has been identified as
the most potent technology for rescuing
Africa from the effects of food shortages .

57. World focused on issues such as poverty and food
Security , as well as species loss and ecosystem
destruction ; these quistions are among the most
important and the most difficult in any society .
Scientific controversies regarding genetic science
cannot be resolved or decided on the basis of a
simple restatment of the scientific issues .

58. Developing country should establish a strategy
Put in place a legislation for promoting and
facilitating public awareness and education
concerning the new technologies .
Developing country should establish a
mechanism to ensure public access to
information on GM plants or animals that
might be imorted or experimented .

59. Thank you for your attention .