A crypto billionaire is ready to invest in CRISPR baby tech

Brian Armstrong, the billionaire CEO of the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, says he’s ready to fund a US startup focused on gene-editing human embryos. If he goes forward, it would be the first major commercial investment in one of medicine’s most fraught ideas. In this edition of What’s Next in Tech, learn more about the controversial world of embryo editing. 

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The stigmatized idea of embryo editing could get a massive boost from “tech bros”—and some scientists are cheering them on.

In a post on X June 2, Armstrong announced he was looking for gene-editing scientists and bioinformatics specialists to form a founding team for an “embryo editing” effort targeting an unmet medical need, such as a genetic disease.

The announcement from a deep-pocketed backer is a striking shift for a field considered taboo following the 2018 birth of the world’s first genetically edited children in China—a secretive experiment that led to international outrage and prison time for the lead scientist.

According to Dieter Egli, a gene-editing scientist at Columbia University whose team has briefed Armstrong, his plans may be motivated in part by recent improvements in editing technology that have opened up a safer, more precise way to change the DNA of embryos.

That technique, called base editing, can deftly change a single DNA letter. Earlier methods, on the other hand, actually cut the double helix, damaging it and causing whole genes to disappear.

Embryo editing, which ultimately aims to produce humans with genes tailored by design, is an idea that has been heavily stigmatized and starved of funding. While it's legal to study embryos in the lab, actually producing a gene-edited baby is flatly illegal in most countries.

In the US, the modified baby ban operates via a law that forbids the Food and Drug Administration from considering, or even acknowledging, any application it gets to attempt a gene-edited baby. But that rule could be changed, especially if scientists can demonstrate a compelling use of the technique—or perhaps if a billionaire lobbies for it.

In his post, Armstrong included an image of a seven-year-old Pew Research Center poll showing Americans were strongly favorable to altering a baby’s genes if it could treat disease, although the same poll found most opposed experimentation on embryos.  

Up until this point, no US company has openly pursued embryo editing, and the federal government doesn’t fund studies on embryos at all. Instead, research on gene editing in embryos has been carried forward in the US by just two academic centers, Egli’s and one at the Oregon Health & Science University.

Those efforts have operated on a relative shoestring, held together by private grants and university funds. Researchers at those centers said they support the idea of a well-financed company that could advance the technology.  “We would honestly welcome that,” says Paula Amato, a fertility doctor at Oregon Health & Science University and the past president of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. 

“More research is needed, and that takes people and money,” she says, adding that she doesn’t mind if it comes from “tech bros.” Read the story.

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Get ahead with these related stories:

1. A US court just put ownership of CRISPR back in play — At stake in the ongoing patent dispute over the gene-editing tool are rights to the most important new biotechnology of the age and credit for inventing it.
2. Ethically sourced “spare” human bodies could revolutionize medicine — Human “bodyoids” could reduce animal testing, improve drug development, and alleviate organ shortages.
3. Access to experimental medical treatments is expanding across the US — Right to Try laws are being adopted and expanded throughout the country. In one state, they’ll allow healthy people to access unproven treatments.

Image: Michelle Watt/Coinbase