CRISPR: EDITING THE GENOME THEORY
Reshuffling the deck, what pops up is the advancement of technology in the medical field. “Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR)” is a Herculean tool used to edit genomes and modify gene function. CRISPR is an array of DNA sequence composed of the protein Cas9 which acts as a pair of molecular scissors, capable of cutting strands of DNA. This CRISPR-Cas9 system has greatly influenced the scientific community with perks of being faster, cheaper and accurate.
Adapted from the natural defense mechanisms of bacteria and archaea, the CRISPR Technology rectifies genetic defects thereby, curing diseases otherwise incurable. The DNA of the invading virus is captured by the bacteria and used as DNA segments or CRISPR Arrays! The bacteria “remembers” the virus it is invaded by, and produces RNA segment from these CRISPR arrays to target the DNA of the virus, on its next attack, Cas9 then cuts the DNA apart, which disables the virus. Consequently, defected pieces of genetic material are added or deleted to make the required changes to the DNA by replacing the defected segment with the customized one.
This “cut-and-paste mechanism of genes” can reduce the severity of genetic deafness in mice, mushrooms that don’t brown easily and restructuring of bone marrow cells in mice. With unflinching efforts, CRISPR can one day wipe-out the entire community of malaria spreading mosquitoes or the recreation of extinct passenger pigeons.
‘Editing the Genome Theory’ has been the point of convergence in the medicine sector, to prevent incurable human diseases, including single-gene disorders such as Cystic Fibrosis, Haemophilia and sickle cell disease to name a few! Currently, the genome editing is practised on animals and cells and after the green signal, this can also cure cancer, heart disease, mental illness and HIV infection.
Stats state that CRISPR-Cas9 is easy to use with 4x more efficiency than the previous best ‘TALENS’. Expanding its services to food and agricultural industries by engineering probiotic cultures and vaccinate them against viruses, CRISPR is not hundred percent efficient and is supposed to have ‘off-target effects’ such as unintended mutations or “gene vandalism”.
If gone wrong, CRISPR- manipulated cells can trigger cancer in the carrier. Contrary to this, in November 2018, there was a reported case, from China, of having produced world’s first human twins resistant to HIV, through CRISPR technology! This experiment was worldwide termed to be against the ethical norms while many countries have stated that they won’t fund any genome-editing.
CRISPR for sure is going to revolutionize the world of medicine albeit slowly, if dealt with sensitively. Modifications and developments in this tool will help study the diseases, overcome them and impart biomedical sciences “The Edited Theory”.
