A throwback to the 20th century leads us to one of the most advanced breakthroughs of modern science: Genetic Engineering. It’s befuddling that a combination of 4 letters is the key to understanding all biological lifeforms on Earth. However, this far-reaching technology has humble origins; early nomadic men, in their quest for survival and daily sustenance had selectively bred better varieties of crops and animals, without truly understanding what they were doing, and why. There is archeological evidence that validates such a conclusion.

That which seemed strange to ancient dwellers was quantified by Gregor Mendel, also known as “The Father of Genetic Engineering”, in his laws of inheritance. Although his work was largely ignored for 34 years, he was the first to systematically analyze the patterns of inheritance by breeding garden peas. He also provided evidence regarding hereditary segregation and independent assortment which created scope for further research. Ironically, while his laws were successfully able to predict the dissemination of traits, they did not provide insight into the microscopic functioning of heredity.The world had to wait for another century before Watson and Crick postulated the three dimensional structure of the ever so famous double-helix DNA molecule.

All of a sudden, the field of genetic engineering had shifted focus to the molecular scale, with the top minds of the century dissecting each complex molecule to unearth the truth. The next few years passed in a flurry with various advancements in bacterial, animal, and finally human genetic engineering. The advent of various techniques such as Polymerase Chain Reaction, Restriction Enzymes, and Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer gave biologists an arsenal of tools which helped them in their research. This had far-reaching consequences for society, with the first recombinant DNA molecule being produced in year 1972 by Paul Berg which was soon followed by the cloning of ‘Dolly the Sheep’.

CRISPR, which stands for ‘Clustered Regularly, Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats’, holds a lot of promise for the future of molecular biology. They are segments of prokaryotic DNA containing short, repetitive base sequences with a plethora of potential applications, including medicine and crop seed enhancement.

Human genetic engineering, even in the 21st century, continues to remain the hotbed of controversy, with ethical and safety issues being raised by multiple organizations. Also, several people are skeptical about its implementation, and regulatory institutions exist to prevent any misuse. However, all this does not seem to have perturbed the zeal of the scientific community to take humanity to greater heights.