Five years ago, scientist He Jiankui shocked the world with claims that he created the first genetically edited babies.

Hong Kong has revoked a visa it granted to a Chinese scientist who set off an ethical debate five years ago with claims that he made the world’s first genetically edited babies.

The disappearance of tennis star Peng Shuai in China following her accusations of sexual assault against a former top Communist Party official has shined a spotlight on similar cases involving political dissidents, entertainers, business leaders and others who ran afoul of the authorities.

An international group of scientists has released new guidelines that remove a decades-old barrier to stem cell research.

French scientist Emmanuelle Charpentier and American Jennifer A. Doudna have won the Nobel Prize 2020 in chemistry for developing a method of genome editing likened to 'molecular scissors' that offer the promise of one day curing genetic diseases. “There is enormous power in this genetic tool,” said Claes Gustafsson, chair of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry. In 1911, Marie Curie was the sole recipient of the chemistry award, as was Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin in 1964. ___Read more stories about Nobel Prizes past and present by The Associated Press at https://www.apnews.com/NobelPrizes___This story was first published Oct. 7, 2020. It was updated on Oct. 8, 2020, to correct the aim of clinical trials that are underway with the gene-editing tool CRISPR.

Genetically-modified babies are "highly desirable" to help protect people from disease and could be created ethically within two years, according to a new scientific paper. (CNN) - Genetically-modified babies are "highly desirable" to help protect people from disease and could be created ethically within two years, according to a new scientific paper. However, the practice is hugely controversial due to fears that it could be used to create "designer babies" whose genes have been edited for non-therapeutic purposes. In November 2018 Chinese scientist He Jiankui sparked outrage after announcing he had created the first genetically-modified babies in the world from embryos altered to make them resistant to HIV. Still, he believes an ethical attempt to produce genetically-modified babies could be less than two years away.

- Scientists have developed a new gene-editing technology that could potentially correct up to 89% of genetic defects, including those that cause diseases like sickle cell anemia. Prime editing builds on powerful CRISPR gene editing, but is more precise and versatile -- it "directly writes new genetic information into a specified DNA site," according to the paper. About two-thirds of known human genetic variants associated with diseases are single point gene mutations, so gene editing has the potential to correct or reproduce such mutations. With this method, researchers say they hope to accurately and efficiently correct up to 89% of known disease-causing genetic variations. Gene editing is still a relatively young and rapidly expanding field of study -- CRISPR-Cas9 is based on a decade-old discovery, but was only used on humans for the first time in 2016.