Copy Editing

With insecticide resistance on the rise, gene editing offers an alternative approach to tackling insect vectors of disease. Scientists are beginning to test out the CRISPR/Cas9 system to alter specific genes in an organism’s DNA, and propagate these changes to future generations, a process known as gene drive. Key elements of this toolkit include an enzyme, Cas9, which cuts DNA, and a guide RNA, directing Cas9 to the correct sequence. Cells carrying an engineered gene variant and these components will cleave other copies of the target sequence, then repair them following the template of the modified sequence. This ensures the variant effectively spreads through a population, such as wild mosquitoes. After Anopheles and Aedes mosquitoes, researchers recently designed effective tools for Culex mosquitoes (shown here as larvae), which transmit serious diseases including West Nile virus and avian malaria, paving the way for potential gene drive methods to control these species.

Written by Emmanuelle Briolat

Emmanuelle Briolat

Writer

A researcher specialising in visual signals in Lepidoptera, camouflage and the effects of light pollution, Emmanuelle’s writing covers a range of topics, from biomedical research to children’s books about moth defences.

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• Video from the Gantz Lab, University of California San Diego
• Section of Cell and Developmental Biology, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA
• Video copyright held by the original authors
• Research published in Nature Communications, May 2021