Biotech Beginnings: From Infancy to Impact
CRISPR CRISPR – clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats – were first discovered in the sequences of DNA from Escherichia coli bacteria and described in 1987 by Ishino et al. [1] from Osaka University (Japan) who accidentally cloned an unusual series of repeated sequences interspersed with spacer sequences while analyzing a gene responsible for the conversion of alkaline phosphatase .However, the function of these sequences remained unclear. The first experimental information about the mechanism of action of the CRISPR system was obtained in 2007 in the studies of two French food scientists, Rodolphe Barrangou and Philippe Horvath, who worked with yoghurt cultures of bacteria Streptococcus thermophilus for the Danish company Danisco. Marraffini and Sontheimer published was the first one to describe the presence of genes associated with CRISPR repeats (named by the authors cas1-4, CRISPR-associated genes). These genes were found...