CRISPR as molecular debugging

CRISPR technology is transforming how we manipulate genes to understand their function. To explain CRISPR’s emerging role in genetic engineering, let’s use a metaphor from the world of software engineering. Suppose that a genome is like a massive codebase. There’s a bug somewhere in the codebase, and you need to figure out which line is the culprit. Until CRISPR, altering a particular line of code has been laborious, expensive, and error-prone. CRISPR gives researchers the ability to “comment out” a particular line of code with pinpoint accuracy.

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