Week 7 - Glow in the Dark Cats

This week I bring you some old news, but I just found out about it and think it is a neat example of futuristic technology.

My fantastic find this week stems from the 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, awarded to Osamu Shimomura, Martin Chalfie, and Roger Y. Tsien. Incredibly, this development was half a century in the making. In 1962, Shimomura was able to isolate a specific DNA marker present in certain jellyfish; this gene became known as green fluorescent protein (GFP), which is exactly what it sounds like. Using a light source that provides shorter wavelengths (e.g. UV black light), cells with this gene will emit a green glow unseen by the naked eye under most of the visible light spectrum. With advancements in gene alteration technology, we were able to move from the initial identification to being able to insert the gene into the cells of different organisms.

By itself, the inclusion of GFP is a fun party trick. But the group wasn't awarded a Nobel Prize just for dyeing animals' genes green. Scientists had been attempting forms of gene therapy on animals to help with health concerns, but often did not have an effective way to tell if the protein had successfully taken hold in the body. By bonding the desired alteration with GFP, they would be able to assess the presence of the invisible gene by checking to see if the animal was fluorescent.

Naturally it was only a matter of time until scientists started making neon cats. In cats specifically, GFP is being used to study treatment methods for feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV): a lentivirus similar to HIV-1 and HIV-2 found in humans. Scientists combined an FIV resistant gene found in monkeys with GFP and injected it into the unfertilized eggs of a cat. The cat later gave birth to a litter of glow in the dark kittens with a natural FIV repellent. What's more, those kittens later had fluorescent kittens of their own. While scientists are unable to claim that the gene is 100% effective in preventing FIV, it is a huge step towards the future of an FIV-free world. Successful treatment strategies can hopefully be applied to creating an HIV-free world as well.

Just look at this little kitten