CRISPR DNA base editors with reduced RNA off-target and self-editing activities.

ABSTRACT: Cytosine or adenine base editors (CBEs or ABEs) can introduce specific DNA C-to-T or A-to-G alterations^1-4. However, we recently demonstrated that they can also induce transcriptome-wide guide-RNA-independent editing of RNA bases⁵, and created selective curbing of unwanted RNA editing (SECURE)-BE3 variants that have reduced unwanted RNA-editing activity⁵. Here we describe structure-guided engineering of SECURE-ABE variants with reduced off-target RNA-editing activity and comparable on-target DNA-editing activity that are also among the smallest Streptococcus pyogenes Cas9 base editors described to date. We also tested CBEs with cytidine deaminases other than APOBEC1 and found that the human APOBEC3A-based CBE induces substantial editing of RNA bases, wherea

SUBMITTER: Grunewald J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6730565 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature