Scientists have a bold idea to fight Lyme disease: Change the mice | 60 Minutes Archive
In a Nutshell
Scientists are developing genetically engineered white-footed mice that carry a heritable Lyme-resistance antibody, aiming to break the disease transmission cycle by making ticks that feed on mice unable to acquire the bacteria. The approach targets Nantucket, where Lyme affects 15% of residents, with engineered mice planned for gradual release after community consent and ecological testing on a private island. The project represents the first attempt to use CRISPR-based gene editing to permanently alter a wild population's immunity, requiring both regulatory approval and local democratic decision-making before any field deployment.
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Biologist Charles Darwin began crafting his theory of evolution on a trip to the Galapagos Islands, where he discovered animals had developed unique traits that varied from island to island. Nearly two centuries later, on a different island, scientists aren't just observing evolution, they now have the technology to shape it. This past year, a team of modern-day Darwins on Nantucket are hoping to use genetic engineering to reduce the transmission of Lyme disease, a tick-borne illness found primarily in the Northeast and Upper Midwest, but also throughout the United States. The scientists' target is not the deer often associated with the disease or even the ticks, but wild mice, the main carriers of Lyme. It's a first-of-its-kind approach, where scientists and locals are working together to decide whether to sculpt evolution.
30 miles off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, is the island of Nantucket, a 14-mile long, 3-mile wide oasis known for its natural beauty, pristine shorelines, and protected landscape. A scourge has afflicted 15% of its residents. The natural disaster in the area is not hurricanes or tornadoes or earthquakes, it is Lyme disease. It is the one plague that might be severe enough that communities might want to engineer a wild organism in order to get rid of it, or at least reduce the level a lot.
Last October, deep in the island's brush, MIT associate professor Kevin Esvelt, a pioneer in genetic engineering, was waving a white flag in search of ticks. These tiny vectors of Lyme disease were not hard to find. These are the big ones because these are largely adults. Nymphs are often poppy seed sized. Esvelt's collaborator is Sam Telford, an epidemiologist at Tufts University who's been studying ticks on Nantucket for the last 40 years. There's a 50% chance, maybe more, that a tick is actually carrying Lyme disease. These guys will swell up 50 to 100 times that size with blood when engorged.
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