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Base editors designed to convert one DNA nucleotide to another may also perform large numbers of unwanted edits to RNA, according to a study published earlier this week (April 17) in Nature. Although base editing was touted as a more precise genome-editing approach than more traditional methods, researchers in the US found that the technique appears to cause widespread changes to the transcriptome of human cells, suggesting that the technology needs more work before it can be used reliably in research and therapeutics.
“Most investigation of off-target base editing has focused on DNA, but we have found that this technology can induce large numbers of RNA alterations as well,” study coauthor J. Keith Joung of Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School says in a statement. “This surprising finding suggests the need to look at more than just genetic alterations when considering unintended off-target effects of ...
