CRISPR – Biotechnology of the Future

In 1987, Japanese scientists from Osaka University reported an unusual occurrence they had observed in a strand of E. coli bacteria. A strange part of the strand’s DNA contained five repetitions of the same sequence of 29 nucleotides (the basic building blocks of DNA), interrupted by divergent sections consisting of 32 nucleotides. Schematically, the sequence can be described as ABACADAEA, where A stands for the segment that repeats, while B, C, D, and E are the divergent parts. This was the...