Journal of Genetics and DNA Research

Chronic insomnia, a public health crisis affecting 10-15% of the US population and costing billions of dollars per year, is frequently associated with one or more comorbid psychiatric or organic conditions. Chronic insomnia has historically been classified as "secondary" to a presenting comorbid condition, resulting in under-recognition and under-treatment of both the insomnia and the comorbid condition (s). Chronic insomnia receives little, if any, public policy attention despite being critical in any model of comorbid disease management.

In prokaryotes, the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) system provides adaptive immunity against plasmids and phages. This system inspired the development of the CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing system, which is a powerful genome engineering tool. The CRISPR/Cas9 technique has been used to investigate the functions of cancer-related genes, establish tumor-bearing animal models and probe drug targets, greatly increasing our understanding of cancer genomics. In this paper, we examine the current state of CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing technology in oncological research. We begin by explaining the fundamental principles of CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing before introducing several new CRISPR-based gene editing modes. The rapid progress of CRISPR screening in revealing tumorigenesis, metastasis and drug resistance mechanisms is then described.