The coronavirus pandemic is accelerating the development of CRISPR-based tests for detecting disease and highlighting how gene-editing tools might one day fight pandemics, one of its discoverers, Jennifer Doudna, tells Axios. <\/p>\n
Why it matters: Testing shortages and backlogs underscore a need for improved mass testing for COVID-19. Diagnostic tests based on CRISPR which Doudna and colleagues identified in 2012, ushering in the \"CRISPR revolution\" in genome editing are being developed for dengue, Zika and other diseases, but a global pandemic is a proving ground for these tools that hold promise for speed and lower costs. <\/p>\n
Driving the news: Last week, the NIH awarded $250 million for the development of COVID-19 diagnostic tests to a handful of companies, including Mammoth Biosciences, which is working on a CRISPR-based test that CEO Trevor Martin says will deliver 200 tests per hour per machine.<\/p>\n
The challenge now is \"getting it into a format where it can be used easily either in a laboratory or at the point-of-care,\" like the doctor's office or home, she says.<\/p>\n
How it works: Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats, or CRISPR, are sequences of genetic code that bacteria naturally use to find and destroy viruses.<\/p>\n
That editing ability is viewed as having vast potential for treating disease, a nascent use of CRISPR.<\/p>\n
But there's a persistent problem: Getting the sizable CRISPR system through the membranes and to the DNA of the cells that need editing.<\/p>\n
And, there are other concerns about off-target editing with currently available enzymes and unknown long-term effects of gene editing directly in the body. <\/p>\n
The intrigue: CRISPR could one day be wielded in future pandemics.<\/p>\n
Yes, but: That would require sophisticated understanding of how a virus changes and the immune system's complex response to it. <\/p>\n
The big picture: Such \"genetic vaccination\" is a long way off, but it could eliminate having to wait until a virus shows up, make a vaccine to that virus and then vaccinate people, she says.<\/p>\n
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CRISPR co-discoverer on the gene editor's pandemic push - Axios<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The coronavirus pandemic is accelerating the development of CRISPR-based tests for detecting disease and highlighting how gene-editing tools might one day fight pandemics, one of its discoverers, Jennifer Doudna, tells Axios. Continue reading