Eggs From These Genetically-Modified Chickens Could Be A Cure For Cancer Soon

In what could be a major breakthrough in the field of gene engineering and medical science, researchers in the University of Edinburgh's Roslin Institute have developed chickens that can lay eggs with anti-cancer drugs.

This was made possible after the scientists successfully resisted the DNA of the chickens to add human proteins in their eggs.

According to BMC Biotechnology the eggs contain IFN alpha 2a, which has both anti-cancer and anti-viral properties, and macrophage-CSF, which is being developed as a therapy to trigger damaged tissue to repair itself.

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Lissa Herron, one of the researchers who was behind the project told the BBC that the new chicken will also help in producing more chicken which cost anywhere from 10 to 100 times less.?

"If you want to have more eggs, you just need more birds. And that's why we have in this pen a cockerel and he can produce a lot of children in a short time," Herron said.

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According to scientists the genetically modified chicken are capable of laying upto 300 eggs a year.

"Our work optimizes and validates a transgenic chicken system for the cost-effective production of pure, high quality, biologically active protein for therapeutics and other applications," the researchers said.