CRISPR, crispr genome editing system

CRISPR Critters: Regulators and the New Gene Revolution in Agriculture

It’s CRISPR’s world, and we’re just living in it. The gene-editing technology, which has been likened to a genetic word processor, allows researchers to make specific changes ranging from tweaking a single DNA base pair to revising whole paragraphs of genetic information. Most of CRISPR’s media attention has focused on the vast improvements it could bring to medicine, such as fixing genetic diseases, curing cancer, speeding up vaccine development, andovercoming antibiotic resistance in disease-causing microbes. Less widely reported, but no less momentous, are the dramatic transformations that CRISPR will bring to nearly all aspects of farming. All that is needed for this new green revolution to take off is for regulators to get out of the way. Thanks to entirely...

12.03.2016 admin News No Comment

Improved CRISPR System Reads Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Genome For the First Time

With an enhanced form of the CRISPR-Cas9 system, scientists were able to read the genome of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) for the first time. The new system provides a more temporary gene modification that will be extremely useful for scientists using this method to conduct therapeutic gene editing techniques. The new study builds off of a 2013 method developed by Stanly Qi, PhD, who is also a co-author on the current paper. Qi designed CRISPR interference (CRISPRi), a system with the ability to “inactivate genes in IPSCs and heart cells created from iPSCs.” CRISPRi improves the original system because genes can be silenced or turned off “more precisely and efficiently.” Plus, CRISPRi offers additional beneficial characteristics like deletion flexibility...

12.03.2016 admin News No Comment

CRISPR Design Tools for Genome Editing: the full list with description

In just four years, CRISPR has revolutionized approaches to genome editing. Inexpensive to build and easy to use, CRISPR (Clustered, Regularly Interspaced. Short Palindromic Repeats) has gained worldwide attention for its ability to target specific locations in the genetic code of any organism with just two elements – guide RNA and an enzyme called Cas9. CRISPR was originally discovered as a genetic phenomenon in archaea and certain bacteria – an immune response that could be adapted for purposes of modifying the genes of higher organisms. Applications of crispr system design include genetic moderation of crops, gene therapies for diseases such as cancer, and synthesizing drug-producing microbes. CRISPR’s applications may be even more far-reaching in the future – but some fine-tuning...

08.03.2016 admin News 2 Comments

How the US CRISPR patent probe will play out

There is no shortage of optimism about the scientific potential of CRISPR–Cas9, a technique that can precisely alter the genomes of everything from wheat to elephants. But there is a great deal of confusion over who will benefit financially from its use. On 10 March, the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) will begin an investigation into who deserves the patent on using CRISPR–Cas9 to edit genes. This ‘patent interference’ could determine who profits from CRISPR in coming years. Already, companies have sprung up to take advantage of the technique in agriculture, industrial biotechnology and the treatment of human diseases. One firm, Editas Medicine in Cambridge, Massachusetts, raised US$94 million when it went public on 2 February, even though it does not...

08.03.2016 admin News No Comment

Researchers enhance CRISPR gene editing technology

Scientists have developed a process that improves the efficiency of CRISPR, an up-and-coming technology used to edit DNA. “Scientists all over the world are using CRISPR right now in their studies, but the technology is not as functional as it could be,” says Haoquan Wu, Ph.D., who enhanced the process and is a biomedical scientist at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso). CRISPR is a groundbreaking technology that allows scientists to modify genes. Two key components make CRISPR’s DNA editing ability possible. The first is Cas9, an enzyme capable of cutting DNA. The second component is single guide RNA, which directs Cas9 on exactly which portion of a DNA strain to snip to deactivate the...

03.03.2016 admin News No Comment

Bayer and Baxalta Battle for Gene Editing Domination With Billions of Dollars at Stake

The announcement comes hot on the heels of a now-$335 million deal between aspirin mainstay Bayer AG and gene editing startup CRISPR Therapeutics to create commercial gene therapies to treat congenital heart disease, blindness and blood disorders. We are very impressed by the scientific team of CRISPR Therapeutics as they have built the most promising gene-editing technology on the market, Dr. Axel Bouchon, head of the Bayer LifeScience Center, said in a press release. This is perfectly suited to fully leverage Bayer’s expertise in protein engineering and knowledge in the targeted disease areas of this [joint venture]. While the technologies CRISPR Therapeutics and Precision Bio use are different – CRISPR Therapeutics uses CRISPR/Cas9, Precision Bio has a proprietary method called...

03.03.2016 admin News No Comment

Software Helps Gene Editing Tool CRISPR Live Up to Its Hype

New algorithms make CRISPR as easy as point-and-click Biotechnologists are jumping at the chance to use the revolutionary gene-editing tool known as CRISPR. The molecular gadget can be programmed to accurately tweak the DNA of any organism, but scientists need software algorithms to hasten the programming process. Dozens of teams are developing such software, and each faces the task of keeping up with rapidly evolving science and an increasingly crowded field. CRISPR—short for Clustered, Regularly Interspaced, Short Palindromic Repeats—is a genetic phenomenon found in microbes that scientists adapted to disable a gene or add DNA at precise locations in the genetic code. CRISPR isn’t the first gene-editing tool on the block, but it is by far the simplest and cheapest,...

23.02.2016 admin News No Comment

Desktop Genetics, Imperial College London Receive $430K Grant to Build CRISPR Software

Genome editing software company Desktop Genetics and Imperial College London’s cancer epigenetics unit have received a £300,000 ($430,000) grant from Innovate UK, which they will use to develop software tools that selectively design CRISPR/Cas9 targets against cancer cell lines that are characterized at the epigenetic level. The planned software tool will combine Desktop Genetics’ predictive biomodelling capabilities with heterogeneous genomic and epigenomic datasets. It will help researchers investigate the epigenetic mechanisms that underpin resistance to chemotherapy in ovarian cancer cell lines. “This project will combine the best elements of epigenetic research, bioinformatics, and CRISPR to create a tool that solves a real problem in the field of oncology,” Bob Brown, chair of translational oncology in Imperial College’s department of surgery...

23.02.2016 admin News No Comment

British approval of embryonic gene editing research brings CRISPR into focus

The newest developments in editing genes in human embryos will come from the United Kingdom after scientists from the Francis Crick Institute were granted approval to work on human gene editing in embryos. In early February, the British government’s fertility regulator granted a research application for institute researchers who will reportedly use gene editing techniques to analyze the earliest stages of embryo development in the first weeks after conception. We’ve discussed gene editing techniques involving CRISPR and Cas9 in recent weeks here on IPWatchdog, especially their use in combating HIV/AIDS. However, the use of the Cas9 enzyme to snip genetic code of specific CRISPR clustered repeats, or to insert new code, could eventually be used to edit code in embryos,...

23.02.2016 admin News No Comment

Jennifer Doudna Answers Questions about CRISPR

JENNIFER DOUDNA SPEAKS AT HER 13 FEBRUARY PLENARY SESSION AT THE 2016 AAAS ANNUAL MEETING. | BOSTON ATLANTIC PHOTOGRAPHY Last year, the genome-editing method CRISPR came to power as a technology poised to change everything from how we fight disease to whether we might finally be able to rid the world of the mosquito. The journal Science named CRISPR its Breakthrough of the Year, and Time magazine named one of its discoverers, University of California, Berkeley’s Jennifer Doudna, as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. In her 13 February plenary talk at the 2016 AAAS Annual Meeting, Doudna took her audience through the technical breakthroughs that turned her “curiosity-driven science project” on how bacteria build immunity against viruses...