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Horizon Discovery, Desktop Genetics to Develop CRISPR Design Platform

Dec 17, 2013 | staff reporter

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Horizon Discovery today said that it is collaborating with Desktop Genetics to develop a CRISPR design platform.

The Cambridge, UK-based firm said that Desktop Genetics will design and implement algorithms based on input from Horizon, which said it will use the platform to quickly identify the best guide-RNAs in the human genome for each gene editing task as part of its Genesis portfolio of gene editing technologies.

CRISPR is an RNA-guided gene editing system that can introduce either a targeted double strand break or single strand nick in the genome of mammalian cells. Earlier this year Horizon non-exclusively licensed the CRISPR gene editing technology from Harvard University.

Terms of the alliance with Desktop Genetics were not disclosed.

London-based Desktop Genetics develops software tools for a variety of molecular biology research applications including gene expression, cell line development, and gene editing.

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