Cpf1 proteins excise CRISPR RNAs from mRNA transcripts in mammalian cells
June 19th, 2017 by Guocai Zhong
Nature Chemical Biology 13, 839 (2017). doi:10.1038/nchembio.2410
Authors: Guocai Zhong, Haimin Wang, Yujun Li, Mai H Tran & Michael Farzan
Cpf1 is a CRISPR effector protein that has greater specificity than Streptococcus pyogenes Cas9 (SpCas9) in genome-editing applications. Here we show that Lachnospiraceae bacterium (Lb) and Acidaminococus sp. (As) Cpf1 orthologs have RNase activities that can excise multiple CRISPR RNAs (crRNAs) from a single RNA polymerase II–driven RNA transcript expressed in mammalian cells. This property simplifies modification of multiple genomic targets and can be used to increase the efficiency of Cpf1-mediated editing.