CRISPR/Cas-9 System: Magnificent Tool for Genome Editing

 Kavita Vasdev*, Indra Mani  

The recent development of clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)is a key technology for genome editing, targeting, and regulation in a wide range of organisms and cell types. The CRISPR features may be exploited for typing purposes, epidemiological studies, host-virus ecological surveys, building specific immunity against undesirable genetic elements, and enhancing viral resistance in domesticated microbes. Microbes rely on various defense mechanisms, which allow them to resist viral predation and exposure to invading nucleic acid. In several bacteria and most archaea, CRISPR form peculiar genetic loci, which provide acquired immunity against viruses and plasmids by targeting nucleic acid in a sequence-specific manner. CRISPR-Cas9 is an RNA-mediated adaptive immune system that protects bacteria and archaea from viruses or plasmids. In this review, we emphasize the current progress and the future potential of the CRISPR-Cas9 system towards biomedical, therapeutic, industrial, and biotechnological applications.

Enhanced Production of Aloe Mannan Using Plant Biotechnology

Zarreen Badar*, Saifullah Khan, Shakeel Ahmed, Muhammad Iqbal Choudhary

Plant tissue culture is a promising technology, especially for the multiplication and production of novel and improved plants species and for an increased biosynthesis of products of industrial and medicinal value from vegetative resource. The development of a callus route was availed to investigate the in vitro plants for enhanced production of the bioactive polysaccharide acemannan in Aloe barbadensis plants. 8 mg/L NAA and 1.5 mg/L BAP with four different carbon sources (sucrose, mannose, glucose and galactose) and five concentrations (2, 3, 4, 5 and 6%) and kept in dark conditions for 1 month. The production media and light conditions played a vital role to increase the acemannan levels in stress conditions. The investigation revealed quite interesting results as the acemannan yield increases several fold in the in vitro regenerated callus cultures and Aloe barbadensis plant extracts analyzed for acemannan content by HPLC. Cultures incubated in media having 3 % mannose sugar produced the highest concentration of acemannan i.e 0.95 mg/mL, which revealed a remarkable enhancement of acemannan production as compared to the in vivo production in Aloe vera plant in soil conditions giving yield of 0.43 mg/mL acemannan. Cultures in media having 3% sucrose only increased 2% production of this compound in vitro giving 0.44 mg/mL yield. On the contrary, when glucose and galactose were added in the culture media the yield of acemannan was suppressed in all the tested concentrations.