---
title: "These $17,000 Mice Are Gene-Edited to Mimic Human Diseases"
description: "## Gene Hackman"
date: "2019-04-02"
modified: "2019-04-02"
authors:
  - name: "Jon Christian"
    job_title: "Executive Editor"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/jonc"
url: "https://futurism.com/neoscope/gene-edited-mice-human-diseases"
categories:
  - "Health & Medicine"
tags:
  - "biotech"
  - "CRISPR"
  - "mice"
  - "the digest"
---

# These $17,000 Mice Are Gene-Edited to Mimic Human Diseases

![A fascinating new story looks at the growing market for mice that have been gene-edited to mimic human disease ranging from prostate cancer to diabetes.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/mice-gene-edited-human-diseases.png>)
*\<em\>Image: Tag Hartman-Simkins\</em\>*

## Gene Hackman

A fascinating new [*Bloomberg* story](<https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-01/china-s-demand-for-17-000-gene-altered-lab-mice-is-skyrocketing>) looks at the growing market for mice scientists have gene-edited to mimic human diseases ranging from prostate cancer to diabetes.

Researchers are shelling out big money for the CRISPR-modified rodents, according to *Bloomberg*, sometimes paying as much as $17,000 for a pair — a medicine-disrupting development that's projected to be a $1.59 billion industry by 2022.

## Mouse Model

*Bloomberg* talked to Charles Lee, a former Harvard Medical School professor who's using the gene-edited mice to develop new personalized cancer treatments in China.

"When you do these experiments, you want to be as close as possible to the way these tumors are growing in our bodies," Lee told the magazine. "That’s not in a test tube or a petri dish. That’s in a living organism."

**READ MORE:** [China's Selling Genetically-Modified Mice for $17,000 a Pair](<https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-01/china-s-demand-for-17-000-gene-altered-lab-mice-is-skyrocketing>) \[*Bloomberg*\]

**More on mice:** *[Scientists Give Mice “Super Vision” With Eye Injections](<https://futurism.com/neoscope/mice-night-vision-nanoparticles>)*

## Author
I'm responsible for editing, assigning, and scouting at Futurism, as well as occasionally writing for the site. That work involves keeping an eye on a wide range of narratives and issues, but over the past few years I've become increasingly interested in how AI is shaping the future of media, the web, and information itself. My day-to-day often involves collaborating on reporting and commentary projects bylined by my colleagues, but I try to find time to do my own reporting as well; stories I've broken for Futurism have been cited by publications including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the New Yorker, Wired, Ars Technica, New York Magazine, the Columbia Journalism Review, Bloomberg, and more. I grew up in Southern Vermont and attended Vanderbilt University. Prior to Futurism, I contributed to outlets including the Boston Globe, Vice, Wired, Slate, the Atlantic, the Outline, Ars Technica and more, and did stints in farming and food service. I currently live in Brooklyn, New York, and in my free time I enjoy pinball, word games, cycling, running, and music production.

### Author social links  
[Bluesky](<https://bsky.app/profile/jonchristian.net>)