CRISPR-Cas9 is a new(ish) technology that is used for knocking out human genes in cell lines for the purpose of seeing what these genes do. CRISPR-Cas9 has a “protein scissor”, the cas-9 protein, and a location that shows the cas9 where to bind to. The “location” is actually a strand of RNA that is complementary to a specific strand of DNA. This RNA strand is like glue in that it binds to the DNA and allows the Cas9 to cut the DNA. This process or the CRISPR-Cas9 technology is like an endless cycle of cutting and repairing DNA until the repair enzyme can no longer repair the DNA or makes a mistake. This technology can make the process of cutting and disabling genes five times faster. It allows scientists to edit parts of a genome by altering, removing, or adding certain sections of DNA. While this technology can be very useful in trying to understand what genes do it does have a downside, “these approaches are costly and time-consuming to engineer, limiting their widespread use, particularly for large scale, high-throughput studies.” The picture below shows what this process looks like on a very basic scale. Hopefully this technology will eventually allow us to fully understand what every gene does.
namurthy
"Hi Blakelement! The first line of your post was very attention grabbing! It ..."
namurthy
"Hi Lukewarm! That stats included in your post were shocking! It's crazy to ..."
namurthy
"Hi Lobiotic! I really like how your post connected to people in your ..."
namurthy
"Hi ITSALIVE! This is a really informative post about the higher rate ..."
jouleian
"Hi emdaniels, thank you for sharing this interesting research on the ability of ..."