Glowing Cats a New Tool in AIDS Research 107
sciencehabit writes "Scientists have developed a strain of green-glowing cat by infecting their eggs with a virus containing a foreign gene—the first time this method has worked in a carnivore. Experts say the advance could make the cat a valuable new genetic model—and potentially protect it from an HIV-like virus. "
Re:Commercial application (Score:5, Interesting)
Because everyone panics like little pussies or imposes their little misinformed values on entire populations. They have those glowing tropical fish, and California promptly banned them. One of the state commissioners, Sam Schuchat, an emotional twit, even came out publicly and said it want *not* science but a question of values- *his* values. *He* thought was wrong and spouted a pile of new age religious crap as justification.
Re:please stop calling it "glowing" (Score:4, Interesting)
And in the same strain of disappointing mainstream science reporting, basically everything I've read on this seems to focus on the "we made cats glow green" part, rather than the more serious part of the research, which is to protect against AIDS. The gene to make the cat's fur fluoresce green is just a marker so that they know which cats will also have the gene that could protect against AIDS, and can then run experiments to see if that gene works as they hope. That article seems to be better than average, in that it largely focuses on the AIDS part, and keeps the "omg glowing cats" restrained to the headline and a few spots in the body.
I'm just waiting for the article about the research dog that harbors a cure for cancer, but more importantly, it can skateboard!