CMN Weekly (1 April 2022) - Your Weekly CRISPR Medicine News
Some of the best links we picked up around the internet
By: Gorm Palmgren - Apr. 1, 2022
Top picks
Researchers at InBio have used CRISPR-Cas9 to knock out the major cat allergen, Fel d 1. Experiments were performed in vitro and yielded up to 55% editing efficiencies with no evidence of off-target sites. The study found that Fel d 1 may be nonessential for cats and suggests the approach as a promising route to developing a hypoallergenic cat.
Chinese researchers have released an online repository of anti-CRISPR proteins (Acrs) called Anti-CRISPRdb v2.2. It includes information on inhibitory mechanisms, activities and neighbours of curated anti-CRISPR proteins. The repository shows several improvements to previous databases, including more entries and families and the prediction of Acr neighbours and proteins to be Acrs.
Industry
Integra Therapeutics has closed an additional €1.5-million investment on top of the €4.5 million raised last December. The new funds will support the development of the FiCAT platform prototype that combines CRISPR-Cas9 and PiggyBac transposase technologies and preclinical validation with in vivo and ex vivo models.
A meta-analysis by Chinese scientists concludes that for COVID-19, the diagnostic performance of CRISPR is close to the gold standard. The meta-analysis included 5,857 patients from 54 studies and found the pooled sensitivity and specificity to be 0.98 and 1.00, respectively. In addition, detection assays based on Cas13 were slightly more sensitive than Cas12-based methods and marginally less specific.
In a non-peer-reviewed review, Chinese researchers discuss CRISPR's potential applications to cure COVID-19. Among the suggested possibilities are degrading the viral RNA to terminate the infection, or refining the specificity and safety of CAR-T cells, CAR-NK cells and neutralising antibodies against SARS-CoV-2.
Researchers from China look at CRISPR-Cas12a-based systems as powerful tools for biosensing in food safety. The authors emphasise that the system can be adjusted and reconfigured within days to detect other targets in food safety and that the future development of portable microfluidic devices holds great promise for multiple detections.
The application of CRISPR-Cas systems for the individualisation of cancer precision medicine is the subject of a review by researchers in India. The authors look at the latest developments in the field in terms of optimising the performance of the CRISPR-Cas elements and how this can fuel greater application in precision medicine.
An editorial in Expert Review of Respiratory Medicine looks at the possibilities for CRISPR gene editing for respiratory medicine. The author discusses the clinical potentials for lung cancer and COVID-19 and technical issues like off-target effects, delivery methods, base editing and epigenetic editing.
Polymer-based transfection agents used in CRISPR-Cas9 systems are the topic of a review by researchers in Turkey. The review presents the latest information about current studies related to polymeric carriers used in non-viral CRISPR delivery systems.
Monday's feature article described how a Brazilian research team had developed a method for nasal delivery of CRISPR reagents that overcomes the brain-blood barrier. The researchers used the technique to insert an intact IDUA gene in brain cells and improve mice's cognitive symptoms of mucopolysaccharidoses (MPS I). Experiments will proceed with monkeys later this year.
Wednesday's clinical trial update looked at Graphite Bio's sickle cell disease candidate GPH101. GPH101 is an ex vivo CRISPR-edited cell therapy that is anticipated to provide a permanent cure by targeting the root cause of the disease.
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