Genetics testing start-up offers to ‘genetically optimise’ would-be parents’ babies

If a jeans advert hinting at actress Sydney Sweeney’s “good genes” sent the internet into a frenzy over eugenics – how about one for a company that’s actually selling good genes?

Posters have appeared on the New York subway offering would-be parents the opportunity to “genetically optimise” their future baby.

By signing up to their $8,999 (£6,800) service, Nucleus Genomics will profile the full DNA sequence of up to 20 embryos for couples undergoing IVF.

The New York start-up’s slick app then allows would-be parents to review their brood for known disease genes, conditions like autism and ADHD, as well as traits like eye colour, height, and intelligence.

If a couple choosing their “best baby” smacks of eugenics, I’m mistaken, says Nucleus’ 25-year-old founder Kian Sadeghi.

“What is ‘best’ is using this advanced science to help reduce disease risk,” he says. “And if you’re interested, predict something like the height of your baby.”

Not everyone is buying it, however.

One investor posted that the idea left him “nauseous.”

American behavioural geneticist, Eric Turkheimer, has described Nucleus Genomics and rival embryo-screening firms like Orchid Health as “new eugenics companies”.

Never mind the ethics…

But the biggest problem with Nucleus’ pitch, say experts in human genetics, isn’t that the ethics are questionable, but the science.

Screening IVF embryos for serious genetic or chromosomal abnormalities is now standard practice in IVF clinics. The technique has allowed couples at risk of inherited diseases, like Huntington’s or Tay-Sachs disease, to screen embryos and avoid passing them on to their children.

In the UK, regulations strictly limit the use of embryo screening to such fatal or life-limiting conditions. Not so in the US.

What Nucleus is offering is “choice” over common diseases or traits. And there, whatever the regulations, the predictive ability of genetics falls down.

The risk of heart disease, high blood pressure or schizophrenia can involve tens, hundreds, or even more genes.

When it comes to neurodevelopment conditions like autism and ADHD, or traits like intelligence or height, the genetics can be even more complicated – and outcomes are even less clear when you add in lifestyle and environmental factors.

All a full DNA analysis can offer is “polygenic risk scores” – a statistical overview of what large combinations of genes mean for any given trait in large populations that have their DNA analysed.

Should DNA be destiny?

Last year, the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics concluded that polygenic screening currently offers no proven clinical benefit, nor certainty around how genes in an embryo are expressed as it develops into an adult.

Are Nucleus Genomics just offering would-be parents the illusion of choice?

“We take exceptional care with that,” says Sadeghi. “Between the design of the product, the genetic counselling and the recognition that these things are probabilistic in nature.

“Nobody wants DNA to be absolutely destiny. It’s not, but even if it was, you wouldn’t want that, right? And so I think we lean into that, and that’s what we express to patients.”

The ultimate test of whether they’re offering parents a real choice, or just the appearance of one, will be decided by their customers.

And while their latest ad campaign has led to a 1700% increase in sales, according to Sadeghi, he was unable to tell me whether any couples had successfully used their service to “choose” a baby.

But that’s not to say designer babies aren’t on the horizon.

Large databases of human genes are growing all the time, so too are powerful AIs that can spot patterns associated with particular diseases or traits.

The predictive ability of polygenic risk scores for common diseases like breast and prostate cancer are not far, in some scientists’ opinion, from being clinically relevant.

Nucleus Genomics, says Sadeghi, is pointing the way forward.

“As we educate physicians, as we educate patients, as you educate policymakers, they’re gonna start understanding and seeing the science for what it is, which is a modern way to do preventive medicine,” he claims.

But by offering to “optimise” for things like height and intelligence, “preventative medicine” isn’t all they’re selling.

Elon Musk has backed movement

Their pitch comes as Silicon Valley is in the middle of a baby-designing and baby-making boom.

Elon Musk, reportedly a father of 14, is one of many super-rich tech pioneers obsessed with a shrinking population (in the developed world at least). This “pronatalist” movement is also fascinated with “optimising” future offspring to be as intelligent and long-lived as possible.

Silicon Valley titan Peter Thiel, who shares similar views to Musk on the topic, supported Sadeghi’s start-up through his Founders Fund.

Combine big tech investment, big data from genomic studies with a lack of regulation, and efforts to “code” the next generation seem inevitable. And with it, some profound ethical questions.