CRISPR creates the first genetically modified marsupials | Science

After years of using the CRISPR gene-editing technique to genetically modify everything from vegetables to lab rodents to humans, researchers have used it to edit one of their most difficult targets. on this day: marsupials, MIT Technology Review reports. For the past 25 years, researchers have struggled to genetically modify these mammals – which are born prematurely and finish development in their mothers’ pouches or wombs – because they have thick shells around their eggs and don’t no functional placenta. But researchers at Japan’s Riken Institute finally cracked the code, successfully editing the pigment-producing genes in gray short-tailed opossums. Their efforts resulted in a litter of albino possums (above), researchers reported yesterday in Current biology. The ability to alter genes in marsupials can help biologists better understand animals and use them to study immune responses, reproductive and developmental traits, and common diseases like melanoma.