One nonprofit's plasmid library fueled global CRISPR gene-editing boom
Shepard A, Minones-Moyano E, Mork C, Pyhtila B, Barrangou R
Crispr
The disease-resistant tomatoes or drought-tolerant grains showing up in agricultural research trace back to shared genetic tools like these, distributed through a system that lets scientists everywhere, not just in wealthy labs, tinker with plant DNA.
Since 2012, a nonprofit called Addgene has acted like a library for CRISPR gene-editing tools, collecting them from over 1,000 labs and shipping them out more than 300,000 times. What started mostly as tools for editing human and animal cells has spread into bacteria, yeast, insects, and plants, with newer techniques letting scientists make more precise and varied edits than the original CRISPR method allowed.
Key Findings
Over 20,000 CRISPR-related plasmids have been deposited by more than 1,000 labs and distributed over 300,000 times globally.
Guide RNA and HDR template plasmids make up the bulk of deposits, while cloning backbones are the most requested items.
Editing tools now span multiple effectors (Cas9, Cas12) and modalities (base editing, prime editing, epigenetic editing, CRISPRi/a) across mammalian, bacterial, plant, yeast, and insect research.
chevron_right Technical Summary
A nonprofit lab supply hub called Addgene has shipped CRISPR gene-editing tools over 300,000 times worldwide, with growing use in plants, yeast, and other organisms beyond the usual medical research, showing how a single sharing system helped genome editing spread globally.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
The Diversifying Distribution Trends of Maturing CRISPR Technologies by Addgene.
Since the advent of Cas9-based CRISPR technologies in 2012, there has been a remarkable growth in genome editing research, literature, applications, and translational impact. Much of this research ...
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