Introductory Chapter: Gene Editing Technologies and Applications

Abstract

Gene editing is a type of genetic engineering in which DNA is inserted, deleted, modified, or replaced in the genome of a living organism. Unlike traditional methods that randomly insert genetic material into a host genome, current gene editing technologies target and change the specific genome locations. Zinc finger nucleases (ZFNs), transcription activator-like effectors nucleases (TALENs), and clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPRs)/Cas9 nuclease system are the three common gene editing technologies. These technologies have been widely used in genome engineering to enable a broad range of mutation by inducing DNA breaks that stimulate error-prone repairs such as homologous recombination (HR) or nonhomologous end joining (NHEJ). They successfully make it possible to achieve site-specific editing, modification, and manipulation at specific genomic sites (Table 1) [1].