RNAi, Race, and the Domestication of Biotechnology: The Emergence of Cosmetic Genomics

该项目由科学与社会计划和生物科学理事会在生物学和社会倡议下共同资助，绘制了以前未被研究的化妆品基因组学领域。在这样做的过程中，这项工作更广泛地探索了全球美学产业和人类生命科学之间的关系。具体地说，该项目调查了正在进行的将选择性基因沉默技术应用于消除不需要的体毛的努力。将短干扰核糖核酸(SiRNA)输送到靶细胞的局部乳膏已经在临床试验中；其他核糖核酸干扰(RNAi)技术目前正在研究中。这些基因工具预示着价值数十亿美元的全球脱毛产品和服务市场将发生巨变，这一事实得到了投资者和公司经理的充分理解，他们将资源用于竞争性研究。与此同时，这些旨在终止可见毛发生长的工具的广泛采用，将重新配置一个典型的表型差异标记。因此，RNAi介导的脱毛似乎处于种族和性别变异科学研究的前沿。该项目基于对行业领袖、监管机构和基因组科学家的一系列半结构化采访，通过以下方式推进知识：1)提供了关于基因组学、种族和性别之间新出现的关系的关键新视角；2)阐明了脱毛等看似微不足道的事情对生物技术普及到日常生活的重要性。该项目将对新的基于基因的脱毛产品的研究提供丰富的结构描述，补充现有的几篇分析文献，包括批判性性别研究、种族、科学和技术的社会研究、人类基因组的伦理、法律和社会影响，以及身体改造的文化研究。这项研究的结果将被广泛传播，包括作为美国脱毛科学史的一部分。该项目旨在为普通读者提供有用的工具，以导航不断变化的地形的“个人提升”。

This project, co-funded by the Science & Society program and the Directorate for Biological Sciences under the Biology and Society initiative, maps the previously unexamined field of cosmetic genomics. In so doing, this work explores the relations between the global aesthetics industry and the human life sciences more broadly. Specifically, the project surveys ongoing efforts to adapt techniques of selective gene silencing to the elimination of unwanted body hair. Topical creams delivering short interfering ribonucleic acids (siRNAs) to targeted cells are already in clinical trials; additional techniques of ribonucleic acid interference (RNAi) are currently under investigation.Such genetic tools portend a cataclysmic shift in the multibillion-dollar global market in hair removing goods and services, a fact well understood by the investors and company managers directing resources toward competitive research. At the same time, widespread adoption of these tools, designed to end visible hair growth, would reconfigure a classic marker of phenotypic difference. RNAi-mediated hair removal thus appears to be on the leading edge of scientific studies of racial and sexual variation. Grounded in a series of semi-structured interviews with industry leaders, regulatory authorities, and genome scientists, the project advances knowledge by: 1) offering a crucial new perspective on emerging relations between genomics, race, and gender; and 2) illuminating the significance of seemingly trivial matters like hair removal to the diffusion of biotechnology into daily life. In supplying a richly textured account of research into new gene-based hair removal products, the project will complement several existing analytical literatures, including work in critical gender studies, social studies of race, science, and technology, the ethical, legal, and social implications of human genomics, and cultural studies of body modification. The results of this research will be disseminated broadly, including as a portion of a book-length history of sciences of hair removal in the United States. The project stands to provide general readers with useful tools for navigating the ever-changing terrain of "personal enhancement."