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dCas9-Dnmt3a-Dnmt3L Methyltransferase Seeds a Nuclear Reaction

December 15, 2016

Some scientific breakthroughs are so transformative that there’s no containing their spread once they’ve seeded. By engineering cellular nuclear reactions with a biochemical twist, the most powerful deactivated Cas9 (dCas9) methyltransferase explodes from the lab of Tomasz Jurkowski at the University of Stuttgart. The free energy of this reaction forges not only a new tool […]

Isolating Gene Circuits In Synthetic Vesicles

December 8, 2016

It’s that time of year again: time to attempt the sisyphean task of maintaining peace between relatives who are constitutionally incompatible. Suppose you want both the uncanny gifting skills of Aunt Mildred and the mouth-watering cooking prowess of Uncle Frank. But if you allow them in the same room at the same time, both the […]

PNA Nanoparticles Offer Gene Editing Alternative, Reveal SCF As Editing Enhancer

November 16, 2016

CRISPR/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 Knives

November 16, 2016

If 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 […]

Hi-C Captures Chromosome Contacts Critical to Cognition, CRISPR/Cas9 Confirms

November 15, 2016

In today’s world there’s not much you can be sure of, particularly when it comes to understanding the complexities of human cognition. Thankfully, the epigenome offers some much needed explanation, as demonstrated by the insight gained from DNA methylation maps of human neurodevelopment. However, genetic interactions created by 3-D chromosome structure have remained more of […]

Orthogonal, Inducible dCas9s Combinatorially Regulate Gene Expression

November 15, 2016

Turning gene expression up and down is a powerful use of CRISPR/Cas9. Labs around the world have been hard at work figuring out how to use CRISPR to control gene expression – including both transcriptional activation and repression, and then extending it to control translation and the epigenome. Cas9 can be light-activated, and with some […]

A CRISPR-Cas9 Pipeline for Efficiently Editing Blood Stem Cells

November 3, 2016

When it comes to gene therapy, blood diseases are prime candidates. Blood cells are constantly turning over, so you can quickly fix the blood supply if you replace the blood-producing stem cells in bone marrow; i.e., hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells (HSPCs). Transplanting marrow from a healthy donor is one approach, but a match can be difficult […]

Controlling Gene Circuits With sgRNA-RNA Aptamer Hybrids

October 10, 2016

Earlier this year, Chris Voigt’s lab wrote an automated composer for synthetic gene circuits, which can design circuits to do what you want, all the way down to the DNA sequence. As good musicians know, however, the work doesn’t stop once the composer’s ink dries on the page – the next step is to find […]

Reporter of Genomic Methylation Delivers Imprinting and Epigenome Editing Insights

October 3, 2016

Here at EpiGenie we like to think of ourselves as reporters of genomic methylation, but two new studies from the lab of Rudolf Jaenisch at MIT give us a run for our money and demonstrate the utility of their reporter of genomic methylation (RGM). Using RGM, the talented group brings forth a deeper understanding of […]

Multiplexed CRISPR sgRNAs: Express One Get One Free

September 13, 2016

For all the focus on making CRISPR more accurate, effective, compact, and versatile, one key feature has remained elusive: the two-for-one special. In a way, it’s ironic that CRISPR multiplexing – i.e., expressing multiple sgRNAs from the same promoter to target multiple DNA sites – is not more straightforward. After all, natural CRISPR arrays are […]

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