ATAC-see Assaults Chromatin from Two Fronts: Visualization and SequencingNovember 24, 2016After playing hide-and-seq with chromatin for a while, we’re sure you’ve been begging for a new plan of attack to help you see what’s going on. Thankfully, a Northern California collaboration led by the lab of Howard Chang alongside the labs of William Greenleaf, Jan Liphardt, and Jennifer Doudna has brought forth a tactic to […]
Dnmt3C: A New Piece of DNA Methylation MachineryNovember 24, 2016A dog walk in the countryside led to Velcro, the search for chest pain therapies gave us (who me?) Viagra, and a messy microbiology lab bench provided penicillin. Some big research discoveries appear to have arrived in an “accidental” form and maybe, just maybe, new research from the laboratory of Déborah Bourc’his can be spoken […]
SALL4A Sets the Mood for a DNA Demethylation TET-á-TETNovember 16, 2016A romantic “tête-à-tête” between two lovebirds usually involves helping factors which set the mood and make the night move along slickly. A good wine, some soft lighting, and maybe even a little smooth jazz! While that might work for the humble researcher, the “TET-á-TET” involved in DNA demethylation is a slightly different affair and demands […]
PNA Nanoparticles Offer Gene Editing Alternative, Reveal SCF As Editing EnhancerNovember 16, 2016CRISPR/Cas9 may be the flashiest gene editing tool out there right now, but there are certainly other contenders for that throne. We previously profiled Argonautes as one alternative; another is peptide nucleic acids, or PNAs. Like DNA, PNAs are strings of standard nucleotide bases, but instead of a charged phosphate backbone, they are held together […]
Cpf1 And C2c2 Are Multitasking CRISPR Swiss Army KnivesNovember 16, 2016If there’s an official analogy for Cas9, it’s a pair of molecular scissors. Give Cas9 an RNA guide, and it will hunt down the complementary DNA and slice it in two with surgical precision. However, in this, the age of multitasking (HEY! Put down that other screen and pay attention!), being a one-trick pony doesn’t […]
