Your missing links are here (18 September 2020)

Top Picks

• Democracy is coming to genome editing! Tech is too important to be left to the experts, says leading scientists and practitioners. In a new Policy Forum in Science Magazine, they point to the need for establishing a Global Citizens’ Assembly on Genome Editing. Read our interview with co-author Bjørn Bedsted at The Danish Board of Technology Foundation.

• Next-gen CRISPR gene-editing company Graphite Biocomes out of stealth with $45M Series A financing. The core technology stems from Stanford founders Matt Porteus and Maria Grazia Roncarolo. It builds on co-founder Daniel Devers post-doc work on correcting the sickle β globin gene in patient-derived hematopoietic stem cells. C&En story here. Press release here.

• »I am an unusual member of the graphene community. I am not a scientist, I’m a historian turned entrepreneur,« says Ross Bundy, co-founder of Cardea Bio in a great essay. Cardea Bio just announced $7,5M in the first close of Series A2 financing. Also, read our interview with co-founder Kiana Aran on Cardea's CRISPR chip here.

Research

• Gene editing to produce 'super dad' livestock reports Helen Briggs for the BBC on this PNAS research paper. Also, CRISPR-Cas9 Used to Generate “Surrogate Sire” Livestock that Produces Only Donor Sperm.

• Muscular dystrophy condition reversed in mice by RNA-targeting Cas9 packed in AAV viral vectors and injected systemically. Nature Biomedical Engineering paper here. Watch a YouTube video with Gene Yeo on modulating RNA diseases using CRISPR-Cas9.

Clinical Trials

• First Base Editing development candidates named for treatment of sickle cell disease by Beam Therapeutics. »We remain on track to initiate IND-enabling studies in 2020 and file at least one Investigational New Drug application in 2021,« says Beam CEO John Evans.

• Precision BioSciencesreceived fast track designation from the FDA PBCAR269A. PBCAR269A is an investigational allogeneic CAR T therapy for Multiple Myeloma in an ongoing phase 1/2a clinical trial. Precision BioSciences made this cool little video explainer on CAR T featuring frozen samurai warriors and magic goggles (c;

CRISPR patent battle

• Science’s Jon Cohen has the story: The latest round in the CRISPR patent battle has an apparent victor, but the fight continues. Editas press release and Broad Institute press release.

Industry

• Aldevron launches it's new GMP CRISPR Ribonucleoprotein (RNP) Service for clinical applications.

• ERS Genomics and Applied StemCell sign agreement on the commercialization of CRISPR gene editing tools.

• Jumpcode Genomics Exits Stealth Mode, Unveils Technology that Addresses the ‘Needle in the Haystack’ Problem of Molecular Biology.

COVID-19

• STOPCovid with CRISPR – a rapid new test is close. In the New England Journal of Medicine, the Scientists Propose CRISPR Testing for SARS-CoV-2.

• ’All-In-One-Dual CRISPR-Cas12a’ (AIOD-CRISPR) method enables simple, rapid, ultrasensitive, visual detection of SARS-CoV-2, intended for use at home or in small clinics. Nature Communications paper here.

• Report from the trenches. How Addgene is Weathering the Pandemic by Addgene executive director Joanne Kamens.

• Very encouraging preliminary results of a new 3D printed nanoparticle biosensing platform that can sense SARS-CoV-2 antibodies within seconds. The medRxiv preprint here.

• Wired: How CRISPR is helping scientists create a better coronavirus test.

Delivery

• Review. Current status and perspective of non-viral methods of delivery for therapeutic genome editing.

Opinion and visionaries

• »One thing I always say is that Indigenous peoples are not anti-science; we're anti-exploitation.« Excellent interview with geneticist-bioethicist Krystal Tsosie on the ways that genomics and gene-editing technologies are outrunning ethics. And that’s a problem.

• CRISPR gene-editing pioneer Jennifer Doudna gave an interview at the TechCrunch Disrupt 2020 technology conference. More good reads and videos from the Disrupt stage here.

• A proposal to use CRISPR to prevent opioid overdoses is classic useless American healthcare. Response to this piece and this mini-review.

• How CRISPR is tackling the troubling immune response that’s plagued gene therapy until now.

Conferences and Webinars

• View report release webinar of the international panel of experts report stating it's still too soon to attempt to make genetically modified human babies. The International Commission on the Clinical Use of Human Germline Genome Editing released its report, Heritable Human Genome Editing, at the public webinar on September 3, 2020. Also this interesting opinion piece »The U.S. must do some heavy lifting to prepare for heritable genome editing«.

Heh, huh, wow

• CRISPR bacon. Chinese researchers used CRISPR gene-editing to knock-out two genes (CD163 and pAPN) and made pigs resistant to three viruses. The pigs can resist porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus and transmissible gastroenteritis virus, two highly infectious and lethal viruses. Research article in eLife.
• The Genetic Engineering Genie Is Out of the Bottle - The next pandemic could be bioengineered in someone’s garage using CRISPR.