Khalid Simply Says

Do I have common cold or Corona Virus? All of us have had viral infections sometimes in our lives. Common cold, the stomach virus and Influenza virus are some of the more common ones. The current worldwide epidemic named COVID-19 is a respiratory tract illness that is caused by a virus that belongs to the corona virus family. The official name of the virus is SARS-CoV-2. The other well-known viruses in the corona virus family are SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome) viruses. The common way to diagnose infections is to culture the germs, e.g. for suspected strep throat, the doctor takes a swab from the throat and sends it to the lab for culture. The lab grows the bugs in the petri dish and report back to the doctor’s office in day or two. Unfortunately, viruses cannot be grown in the petri dish. So how do we diagnose viral infections?   There are essentially two methods: One is to determine if the patient has the in...

Made-To-Order  Babies   This is not fake news.    Customized and genetically designed children will be available sooner than we think. The day is very near when we will be able to submit the human sperms and eggs to the genetic laboratory. The scientists will run the DNA analysis of these cells within few hours. All the defective or undesirable genes will be edited out and replaced with healthy and “desirable” genes and the fertilized egg will be placed in the body of the host. Initially the host will be a human female, but in the future, perhaps an artificial womb or a robot will carry the fertilized egg through gestation and then  deliver  a “custom designed” health baby.    This used to be in the realm of science fiction or sci-fi movies, but not  anymore .   This is now a reality.    Let’s take a quick refresher about the DNA. In the past, it was believed that DNA was etched in sto...