Absolutely, I mean we learn important things, and of course it could be misused, so I think it’s really important to have a dialogue with society to explain what we are doing, and how these things could be used. And I think it’s really society which should decide how these things should be applied. I think as scientists we should do the best research we can and we should describe the opportunities which are emerging. But then I think it must be discussed with society how this is best applied.

I mean there is always risks with new knowledge, of course that it could be misused, but I think also if you go to eugenics, what I think we have learned really that how closely related human are, how similar we are, which is very important. That all humans share a common history very recently, so we are all very similar in fact. Although, of course we all see differences between humans, but the similarities is what is dominating

Leif Andersson is a professor in Functional Genomics at Uppsala University and guest professor in Molecular Animal Genetics at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences in Uppsala.

His research group did pioneering work using domestic animals for genetic dissection of monogenic and multifactorial traits. Main research project includes genetic analysis of divergent intercrosses in chicken, horses and pigs. Andersson's group describe the genes and mutations affecting a certain trait and study the mechanism of the genes and regulatory elements affected by the mutations.