Genes contain all the instructions an organism needs to live, grow, and reproduce. But identifying a gene and learning what it does are two different things. Scientists don’t know what kinds of instructions many genes contain their functions are unknown.
CRISPR/Cas9 System Could Support Efforts to Conserve Fragile Reef Ecosystems
Written by AZoCleantechDec 22 2020
Researchers can now use the CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing system to gain insights into, and perhaps enhance, the response of corals to the environmental stresses caused by climate change.
Aiptasia photograph. Image Credit: Purchased from Shutterstock.
Led by Phillip Cleves who joined Carnegie’s Department of Embryology this fall the study describes how the groundbreaking, Nobel Prize-winning technology can be used to steer conservation efforts aimed at vulnerable reef ecosystems.
The findings of the research team headed by Cleves were published recently in two papers in the
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Baltimore, MD The CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing system can help scientists understand, and possibly improve, how corals respond to the environmental stresses of climate change. Work led by Phillip Cleves who joined Carnegie s Department of Embryology this fall details how the revolutionary, Nobel Prize-winning technology can be deployed to guide conservation efforts for fragile reef ecosystems.
Cleves research team s findings were recently published in two papers in the
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Corals are marine invertebrates that build extensive calcium carbonate skeletons from which reefs are constructed. But this architecture is only possible because of a mutually beneficial relationship between the coral and various species of single-celled algae that live inside individual coral cells. These algae convert the Sun s energy into food using a process called photosynthesis and they share some of the nutrients they produce with their coral hosts