Two dynamic scientists, Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna won a Nobel Prize in the field of Chemistry in 2020 for presenting a paper on CRISPR/Cas9.
The duo received the award for developing a revolutionary gene-editing tool called CRISPR/Cas9 “genetic scissors” that promises to cure genetic diseases like haemophilia and also cancer. The molecular gene-editing tool was first discovered in the year 2012. The gene-editing system is more refined now to make specific and precise changes of DNA in any kind of living cell – plant, animal or microorganism.
CRISPR-Cas9 has contributed to various important discoveries in research, medicine, and clinical trials. Cas9 molecular scissors for GENOME-editing can be a great revolution in the field of science and medicine.
CRISPR is one of the biggest and indispensable science stories of the decade.
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What is CRISPR/Case9?
Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) is a breakthrough technology that allows scientists to precisely cut and alter or add DNA to any cell. This tool has created a lot of buzz amongst the scientific community. CRISPR/Cas9 is a more precise, fast, affordable and more straightforward method for editing-gene in comparison to traditional ZFN and TALENs. A report by MarketandMarkets reveals that the value of the CRISPR technology market will grow to $1.7 billion by 2023.
CRISPR/Cas9 is a biological version of the “find and replace” method in a word-processing program.
How CRISPR/Cas9 Technology Works?
CRISPRs is a microbial “immune system” that works towards protecting bacterial genes and help fight against any invading viruses. CRISPR/Cas9 technology additionally has two key molecules that are capable to change the DNA of cells.
Two Key Molecules of CRISPR/Cas9:
- An enzyme called Cas9, which is a pair of “molecular scissors”. This cuts the two strands of DNA at a particular location in the genome to insert or remove DNA in that place.
- A piece of RNA known as guide RNA (gRNA). This has a small piece of the pre-designed RNA sequence that further guides Cas9 to cut at the precise location in the genome.
Cas9 follows the gRNA as instructed and makes the cut across both DNA strands. This cut help experts to understand if the DNA is damaged and requires repair or replacement. At this point, scientists, can use molecular machinery to alter one or more genes in the genome of the cell or destroy the invading virus as required
CRISPR/Cas9 is currently the most reliable system of gene-editing.
What are the uses of CRISPR/Cas9? Can it help to treat human diseases?
CRISPR Gene-Editing Tool can transform anything. This includes the food you eat, the pets you love, the plants in your garden, the cells in your body and the mosquitoes buzzing around and possibly every organism you can imagine.
Within a few years of invention, CRISPR has evidently seen a great impact on biomedical research and other industries. From altering the crops to treating HIV and producing custom-made pets, CRISPR is likely to impact every area of our lives. Many industries are already using CRISPR/Cas9 for different reasons. CRISPR technique can help treat human diseases, in addition to many other things.
17 clinical trials on humans using CRISPR/Cas9 Gene-Editing are currently in process.
Healthcare
Medical experts believe CRISPR for humans can do wonders. A Chinese scientist revealed the birth of “CRISPR Twins” born from the gene-edited embryo and that extended expert’s imagination about the potential of CRISPR.
- Diagnostic Testing: Disease detection is the first step towards treating a disease. Using CRISPR, companies are trying to create paper-based diagnostic tests that can without doubt help in early detection of the disease.
- Cancer Treatment: So far using CRISPR for editing DNA in humans has seen a certain amount of success. And hence, scientists are hopeful about using CRISPR to treat cancer. It is believed that it can “find and replace” cancer-causing cells with T-cells to fight cancer. This will be a major focus in the healthcare sector.
- Genetic Disease Treatment: The process of taking away sick cells and injecting healthy cells has the potential to treat a host of genetic diseases. In 2017, CRISPR/Cas9 successfully treated three people with inherited diseases. Medical experts say CRISPR can treat diseases such as blindness, sickle cell anaemia, cystic fibrosis, Down syndrome, and 6,000 other genetic diseases.
- Infectious Diseases Treatment: Scientists in Japan and the USA have already used CRISPR/Cas9 to successfully block HIV-infection from spreading inside patient’s cells. In the future, we would see CRISPR to treat other infectious diseases caused by viruses, bacteria, and parasites.
- Fertility Application: This will be the most interesting development in the CRISPR technology. We might see more healthy, disease-free, and designer babies in the future. In addition, experts believe that miscarriages can be prevented by injecting a protein, which can cause embryos to collapse.
Animal Industry
Using CRISPR to alter genes in animals can be beneficial for the entire ecosystem. Some tested ways are as follows:
- Designer Pets: CRISPR can tailor your next pet into a “designer pet”. A gene-editing tool called TALENTs tried to customize micropigs with certain colours and pattern. But, this experiment by TALENTs failed. Therefore, scientists tried CRISPR/Cas9 technology. They tried the experiment on rats, zebrafish, and pigs to produce transgenic animals, which was successful. On the other hand, a study showed that CRISPR can treat Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy using regenerative techniques in mice. This can be developed as a therapeutic option for humans. CRISPR will be a powerful method to resist diseases like preventing mosquitoes from carrying malaria. It can boost animal breeding and controlling the animal population as well.
- Species Revival: Expert says, soon more than 1 million species can be extinct, which is not only harmful to animals but also for the entire ecosystem. CRISPR is a technology that helps in species revival or de-extinction of dead animals. For instance, Woolly Mammoths are a great example, wherein scientists have used CRISPR to splice mammoth genes and imbibe them into elephants. This created elephant-mammoth hybrids. Similarly, the species revival process through CRISPR/Cas9 is under trial on many other animals as well.
Agriculture Industry
CRISPR gene-editing tool can certainly accelerate the pace of crop modification.
- Enhance Food Quality: For over a decade, dairy industries have been using CRISPR to get rid of viruses for bacteria in cheese and yoghurt. More and more farmers and researchers are trying gene-editing tools to alter crops to make crops better. Scientists, likewise also believe that CRISPR technology can furthermore enhance the taste and nutritional values in crops. It can also make food more pests resistant in future. CRISPR has the potential to develop resilient crops such as drought-resistant maize, groundnuts, sorghum and more to support the environment.
- Preservation: There are a lot of possibilities for improving food preservation using CRISPR. CRISPR can help to preserve food more effectively for a long time. In fact, in 2016, first CRISPR-edited mushroom got approval from the US Department of Agriculture that resisted mushrooms from browning. Surely, this technology has the potential to replace harmful chemical-based food preservatives with organic preservatives.
- Yielding: Editing gene in the plant’s DNA is not a new process. In another case, a few years back, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) tweaked the genes of tomatoes plants, to fasten the yielding process of tomatoes. Scientists think this technology will accelerate corp breeding beyond imagination.
Research and Development
The beauty of switching off certain genes to understand what they do can bring dramatic changes in the R&D industry. Researchers can additionally identify genes that cause diseases and help in the effective development of drugs for treatment. Furthermore, the CRISPR/Cas9 method is quick, cheap and precise, which makes it’s a great tool for researchers to carry out more test and develop new drugs.
Energy Industry
CRISPR can be a game-changer in producing sustainable, renewable biofuel at a competitive cost. In fact, during 2017, ExxonMobil and Synthetic Genomics Inc used advanced cell engineering technologies to modify an algae strain. It improved the algae’s oil content to double its quantity. Using more such experiments with CRISPR can surely evolve the energy industry for good.
All in all, CRISPR/Cas9 genetic engineering technology is not only reliable but, also accurate. Hence, NSA and AI are other sectors that shown interest in using CRISPR for different reasons.
CRISPR Genome-editing has enormous positive potential that humankind has ever seen.
What are the negative effects of CRISPR/Cas9? Can it destroy the human future?
CRISPR/Cas9 has taken the research world by storm, markedly shifting the line between what is possible and what is not. As with any other technology, CRISPR is also not free of controversial outcomes. Moreover, many big brains have raised numerous safety and ethical concerns especially, on the mutation process of CRISPR.
Modifying Human Embryos
To begin with, modifying human embryos can be dangerous and is unnatural. Editing the germline in the human body will certainly impact every cell of the body. Most importantly, the new germline will affect the next generation without their concern.
Risk of Designer Babies
Some parents might indeed try to design their babies with certain qualities. These traits can be anything such as greater intelligence, better skin tone as well as great athleticism.
Off-target Impacts
There are a lot of off-target impacts, particularly when trying gene-editing in human DNA. This, in fact, can also be dangerous. CRISPR technology works by muting cells to understand the nature of the cell. This mutation process might cause a rare form of early-onset Parkinson’s disease.
Unforeseen Consequences
Having unforeseen consequences so far is probably the biggest concern with CRISPR. Cutting out a section of DNA from a particular area can put human life in danger. Several studies also showed editing the genome in humans could cause cancer.
Need Improvements
Although CRISPR for humans has seen some trials, many researchers believe it is not ready for a full-fledged trial on humans yet. Unquestionably, genome editing will need more tools to carry out precise alterations in human DNA.
Ethical Concerns
Gene-editing is controversial and illegal in some countries. As a matter of fact, some people can also use CRISPR to manipulate genes with bad intentions. The process can obviously increase racism, inequality and even conflict in society.
On the Positive side, CRISPR technology can be transformative for human life if used appropriately.
Can you Biohack CRISPR/Cas9?
Josiah Zayner, a biohacker in 2017 injected himself with DNA using CRISPR at a biotech conference. It was a Biohack body experiment in a live stream event, which raised a lot of concerns amongst the biohacking community. This biohack CRISPR experiment furthermore caught Zayner under investigation for practising medicine without a license. Overall, biohacking with CRISPR can be dangerous. It could also lead to legal implications.
Conclusion
To sum up, CRISPR/Cas9 genome engineering technology has created a lot of buzz around the world. It is an invaluable tool for researchers and scientists. The fuming pace of CRISPR development and the ease of use have already overwhelmed the molecular genetics. Indeed CRISPR/Cas9 has the potential to cost-effectively treat complex diseases.
CRISPR FAQ’s
Currently, CRISPR is used to edit genes of plants and animals not much on humans. Scientists believe it can be used to treat diseases such as cystic fibrosis, sickle cell disease, haemophilia, cancer and over 6,000 known genetic diseases.
Anyone practising CRISPR technology without a license will be punished according to the law of any country. Selling “gene-therapy kits” without a warning is illegal in the US and many other countries.
Treating a disease using CRISPR technology will vary based on the type of disease. For example, analysts expect a price of $1 million per patient to treat genetic blindness in children.
CRISPR has been used to create transgenic animals like mice, rats and pigs. It has also been used to grow particular types of fruits, vegetables and crops. But, CRISPR for humans is still under clinical trials.
Researchers have shown positive signs to reverse ageing using CRISPR. The technology chiefly has been used in mice to suppress the accelerated ageing. These mice had Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria syndrome, a genetic disorder that also affects humans. Likewise, Scientists believe CRISPR can successfully reverse ageing by modifying cells that are responsible for ageing in humans.
CRISPR stands for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats.
Undoubtedly, CRISPER is a fascinating and powerful technology. It certainly has the potential to treat many diseases such as blindness, HIV, cystic fibrosis, sickle cell disease, haemophilia, cancer and over 6,000 known genetic diseases.
CRISPR is a gene-editing technique that allows specific, quick and precise modification in DNA of cells – plants, animals and organisms. CRISPR cuts the two strands of DNA at a particular location in the genome to insert, remove or modify DNA in that place.
CRISPR was invented in 1987 by Japanese molecular biologist Yoshizumi Ishino. He is known for discovering the DNA sequence of CRISPR. Yoshizumi was one of the first scientists that found CRISPR in E. Coli.
Yes, CRISPR should be used on humans after sorting concerns raised by researchers. The first human trial is already underway. A university in Portland has administered CRISPR-based medicine to treat an inherited type of blindness.
CRISPR technology has many ethical and social concerns. Researchers think the technology might cause cells to lose their cancer-fighting ability. Moreover, mutation of cells is said to be harmful; it might even lead to serious illnesses.
CRISPR is a gene-editing tool that allows scientists to cut “Genes” using a molecular scissor and modify the DNA where required.
CRISPR technology is certainly a high-risk stock. However, it does have scope for growth and also the potential to change the medical world forever.
According to Forbes, a broad, exclusive license of CRISPR is valued at $265 million in 2017. However, especially after getting Nobel Prize 2020 it worth much more.
There are three stages of CRISPR Immunity System:
1. Adaptation: This is where the protospacer sequence from invading DNA by Cas1 and Cas2. This helps adjacent to the leader at the CRISPR locus.
2. Processing: CRISPR arrays are transcribed and further processed into multiple crRNAs, while each carrying a single spacer sequence and part of the adjoining repeat sequence.
3. Interference: The crRNAs are assembled into different classes of protein targeting complexes (Cascades) that anneal to, and cleave, spacer matching sequences on either
a foreign element or their transcripts.
