CHAPTER 17:CRISPR-based Technologies for Genome Engineering: Properties, Current Improvements and Applications in Medicine

Clustered regularly interspaced palindromic repeats (CRISPR) systems have contributed to a technological breakthrough in all fields of life sciences, making it possible to edit and functionally investigate genomes in a large variety of biological systems. In this chapter we summarize CRISPR-based technologies, describing fundamental properties of CRISPR systems and highlighting some recent developments and improvements as well as future directions. We also describe advances in therapeutics science that this technology has already enabled.