A Genetic Curse, a Scared Mom, and the Quest to ‘Fix’ Embryos

March 12, 2021

(Wired) – Mitochondrial diseases represent a rare but devastating constellation of illnesses that typically derive from a single misplaced letter of DNA, usually in the mitochondria but sometimes in the cell nucleus. Almost from the moment of birth, many children with mitochondrial disease (at least 1,000 each year in the US) struggle to move, breathe, or develop normally. There are a number of mitochondrial diseases, but among the most feared is Leigh’s syndrome. Infants born with Leigh’s rarely survive to their second birthday. As Messer scoured the internet for any tidbit of information that might help Ari, she thought, “Please don’t be this one.”