Since the discovery of CRISPR-Cas systems, people have wondered if a similar type of system exists in eukaryotes. Today, we report in @Nature the characterization of Fanzor, a eukaryotic RNA-guided system that can be reprogrammed for human genome editing. nature.com/articles/s4158… 1/x In exploring the evolution of Cas9, we identified Fanzor (Fz) as a putative RNA-guided nuclease while studying IscB, IsrB, and TnpB–collectively called OMEGA systems–in collaboration with Eugene Koonin’s group. Here, we expand our analysis of the diversity of Fz proteins,… https://t.co/7XIcScOPlhtwitter.com/i/web/status/1…

Delivery of therapeutic molecules is a major bottleneck for treating a wide range of diseases. Today we describe a new modality for delivering proteins based on an engineered contractile injection system @nature nature.com/articles/s4158… 1/ Inspired by the machinery used by endosymbiotic bacteria to deliver protein payloads to their host animals’ cells, we sought to engineer these systems, called contractile injection systems (CISs), for delivery to human cells.

CRISPR technologies are powerful gene editing tools because they are programmable. We are excited to describe 3 new programmable systems, IscB, IsrB, and TnpB, some of the most abundant genes on the planet, with potential for gene editing. @ScienceMagazine science.org/doi/10.1126/sc… 1/ We were exploring Cas9 diversity when we found IscB, a transposon-encoded protein that shares nuclease domains with Cas9. However, unlike Cas9, no RNA or CRISPR components are known to interact with it, making its function a mystery.

We are really excited to share our work on a new modular RNA delivery technology called SEND, built from endogenous components found in the mammalian genome. @ScienceMagazine science.sciencemag.org/content/373/65… 1/ Delivery of nucleic acid therapies to cells remains a bottleneck for gene therapy. We wanted to develop a modular delivery system that would be safe and cell-type type specific, avoiding the immunogenicity of common viral vectors.

We are excited to share STOPCovid, an inexpensive, one-step, & sensitive #COVID-19 detection protocol developed with @omarabudayyeh & @jgooten. This revamped assay was streamlined with the future goal of developing an in-home test for COVID-19. zlab.bio/s/COVID-19-det… 1/X #STOPCovid requires no sample extraction, can be performed using a single mastermix, and uses a paper strip to display results. #STOPCovid can detect down to 100 copies of SARS-Cov-2 RNA from patient samples. 2/X