Name: How Does CRISPR Work?
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NOVA

CRISPR makes gene editing faster, cheaper, and easier than ever before. Here's how.

How does CRISPR work?

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<div class="rich-text"><p>CRISPR makes gene editing faster, cheaper, and easier than ever before. Here's how.</p>
</div>

<div class="rich-text">CRISPR makes gene editing faster, cheaper, and easier than ever before. Here's how.</div>

How Does CRISPR Work?

Body & Brain

<div class="rich-text"><h3>
 How Does CRISPR Work?
</h3>
<p>
 Published May 23, 2018
</p>
<p>
<strong>
  Andre Fenton:
 </strong>
 CRISPR stands for: clustered, regularly, interspaced, short, palindromic, repeats. That’s why it’s just called “CRISPR”.
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<p>
 First discovered in bacteria, CRISPRs are like bacterial immune systems. They have two key parts: a destroyer protein—like one called CAS 9—and a piece of RNA that matches old viruses that previously infected the bacteria.
</p>
<p>
 If the same virus were to invade again, the RNA would recognize the invader’s DNA, attach itself to its old enemy and its CAS partner would slice the virus’s DNA—destroying it.
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<p>
 A few years ago, some researchers realized they could use CRISPR to edit the genome of any living organism.
</p>
<p>
 Here’s the idea: Say I have a stretch of DNA—maybe a part of a gene—I’d like to change. If I know the sequence of letters there—I can build a CRISPR that carries a matching code.
</p>
<p>
 Once inside the cell—CRISPR will scan the DNA until it finds that exact spot. And when it does, it slices the DNA right there.
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<p>
 Now I have a broken gene…but it turns out, I can now insert a new sequence into the gap, and that makes CRISPR potentially an extremely powerful tool.
</p></div>

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