Cut and paste the genome: Genome editing for research and therapy

Abstract

Genome engineering, or alternatively called 'genome editing,' has been one of the rapidly growing fields of biotech- nology for the last few decades. Scientists are now making targeted modifications of genome in any organism of choice with improved precision. In this mini review, we provide basic, fundamental theory and mechanisms of the well-known genome edit- ing technologies such as zinc-finger nucleases (ZFNs), transcription activator-like effector nucleases (TALENs) and clustered regulatory interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)/Cas9 system. We also discuss its role in the field of genetic research and highlight its therapeutic potential as an indispensable tool for the development of personalized medicine to come in near future.