5S rRNA promoter for guide RNA expression enabled highly efficient CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing in Aspergillus niger
In eukaryotes, search and optimization of a suitable promoter for guide RNA expression in CRISPR/Cas9 system is a significant technical challenge. Recently, the research group led by Prof. Jibin Sun and Prof. Ping Zheng used the industrially important fungus, Aspergillus niger, to demonstrate that the 5S rRNA gene, which is both highly conserved and efficiently expressed in eukaryotes, can be used as a guide RNA promoter. Based on this discovery, they established a powerful and highly efficient genome editing toolbox for A. niger. Moreover, this sgRNA expression strategy based on 5S rRNA might constitute a novel and universal solution to build expression cassettes for sgRNA, which will accelerate the implementation of CRISPR/Cas9 system in other eukaryotic organisms.
2018-04-30