Scientific and technological breakthroughs that were once only dreamt up in the pages of fantasy novels

The new Star Wars movie is breaking box-office records at the speed of light, proving time and again the ever-lasting influence of science-fiction fantasy. A part of its popularity, perhaps, rests on a feeling that the fantastic technologies showcased in the film might turn out to be a reality in the future. Some of them do end up as real. 2015 had its own share of scientific and technological breakthroughs, which were once a part of a fantasy. Here are some of them…

Gene editing

Genetic engineering means altering life and that is what we have been doing for over a quarter century by creating new medicines and highly resistant crops. But 2015 has taken genetic engineering to another level. For the first time ever, a human life was saved using gene-editing when doctors at Great Ormond Street hospital in London successfully treated a one-year-old British girl Layla, who was suffering from leukaemia and was not responding to conventional treatment methods. Gene-editing has always been an extremely difficult thing to do. But 2015 also saw the numerous tests of a new tool based on a DNA sequence known as Clustered Regularly-Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) and Cas9 enzyme, which makes gene-editing simple, extremely precise and very cheap. In 2015 it was utilised in several remarkable experiments like the correction of an inherited-disease causing mutation in a non-viable human embryo and disabling mosquitoes from carrying malaria genes. Scientists have claimed that 2015 was a landmark year in genetic engineering and that CRISPR-Cas9 will open immense possibilities for gene therapy in treating diseases like cancer and HIV. The term ‘genetic engineering’ was popularised by Jack Williamson with his 1951 sci-fi novel Dragon’s Island . But references to the technique existed even before that. Also, sci-fi comic books and novels have been graciously employing genetic engineering to create super-natural living beings.