CRISPR

CRISPR Cas9 explained. CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) are segments of prokaryotic DNA containing short repetitions of base sequences. is an RNA-guided gene-editing platform that makes use of a bacterially derived protein (Cas9) and a synthetic guide RNA to introduce a double strand break at a specific location within the genome.

Cas9 is an enzyme that snips DNA, and CRISPR is a collection of DNA sequences that tells Cas9 exactly where to snip.

Jennifer Doudna opens lab at the Gladstone Institutes

September 5, 2018
By Julie Langelier

Jennifer Doudna

Biochemist Jennifer A. Doudna, PhD, has revolutionized biomedical research—and so many other fields—by first unlocking the CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing technique in 2012. Now, she is moving part of her research efforts to the Gladstone Institutes in San Francisco, where she will launch new...

Meet our alumni: David Liu

March 29, 2023
Manuel Ansede | El Pais
Alumnus David Liu

Photo of David Liu via wikipedia. Uncredited.

"We can correct the vast majority of DNA errors that cause genetic diseases"

The Harvard University magazine published almost a couple of decades ago that one of its professors, the chemist...

New Brilliance of Berkeley course to feature Jennifer Doudna

March 4, 2024
College of Chemistry
On March 8, Jennifer Doudna will present the topic "The Chemistry of CRISPR: Origins and Opportunities of RNA-guided Genome Editing."

How to edit the genes of nature’s master manipulators

December 6, 2022
by Aliyah Kovner | Berkeley Lab

Hourglass structure

Scientists are using CRISPR to engineer the viruses that evolved to engineer bacteria. Illustration Davian Ho.

CRISPR, the Nobel Prize-winning gene editing technology, is poised to have a profound impact on the fields of microbiology and medicine yet again.

A team led by CRISPR pioneer...

Reshaping evolution

January 10, 2022
TED Radio Hour | NPR

Illustration of DNA and parade of animals and man

Illustration of DNA with parade of animals and humans. (Adobestock)

New innovations in gene and stem cell technology have the power to shape ecosystems and even change humanity. This hour, TED speakers share the breakthroughs heralding the next scientific revolution.

Guests...

Genetically modified rice could emit fewer greenhouse gases

January 3, 2022
Eric Roston | Bloomberg

Rice planting

Photo: Worker planting rice. (Adobe Stock)

Fifteen years after their initial meeting to discuss what has become the CRISPR revolution, Professors Jill Banfield and Jennifer Doudna of UC Berkeley,...

Newly-discovered 'Borg' DNA Is unlike anything scientists have ever seen

July 15, 2021
Becky Ferreira | Vice.com

DNA strand

Image: KTSDESIGN/ Science Photot Library via Getty Images. Photo courtesy vice.com.

"Borgs" are extrachromosomal elements, meaning that these DNA sequences are found outside the chromosomes that lie within the nucleus of most cells and that contain the majority of an organism’s genetic material. Examples of extrachromosomal elements include plasmids, which can...

FDA approves first test of CRISPR to correct genetic defect causing sickle cell disease

March 30, 2021
By Robert Sanders | UC Berkeley media relations

Sickle cell patients such as Cassandra Trimnell and Evie James Junior and UCSF physician Mark Walters talk about the severe pain experienced by those with the disease and the potential benefits of a CRISPR cure. (Video by UC Berkeley Public Affairs; video of Evie Junior by Colin Weatherby, courtesy UCLA’s Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research)

In 2014, two years after her Nobel Prize-winning invention of CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing, Jennifer Doudna thought the technology was mature enough to tackle a cure for a devastating hereditary...

UC Berkeley launches trial of saliva test for COVID-19

June 30, 2020
By Robert Sanders | UC Berkeley media relations

COVID-19 saliva based test

Scientists from the Innovative Genomics Institute (IGI), the same UC Berkeley group that rapidly popped up a state-of-the-art COVID-19 testing laboratory in March, are now trialing a quicker way to obtain patient samples: through saliva. Saliva, collected in the same way companies like 23andMe and Ancestry.com get samples for DNA genealogy analysis, can be gathered without medical supervision, and that saves time, money and precious PPE.

Megaphages harbor mini-Cas proteins ideal for gene editing

July 20, 2020
By Robert Sanders | UC Berkeley media relations

Illustration of a megaphage injecting its DNA into a gene

The DNA-cutting proteins central to CRISPR-Cas9 and related gene-editing tools originally came from bacteria, but a newfound variety of Cas proteins apparently evolved in viruses that infect bacteria. The new Cas proteins were found in the largest known bacteria-infecting viruses, called bacteriophages, and are the most compact working Cas variants yet discovered — half the size of today’s workhorse, Cas9.