Les Argonautes ont-ils perdu le Nord ?

Chroniques génomiques

Are the Argonauts lost at sea?

UMR 7268 ADÉS, Aix-Marseille, Université/EFS/CNRS, Espace éthique méditerranéen, hôpital d’adultes la Timone, 264, rue Saint-Pierre, 13385 Marseille Cedex 05, France ; CoReBio PACA, case 901, parc scientifique de Luminy, 13288 Marseille Cedex 09, France

^* bertrand.jordan@univ-amu.fr
^** brjordan@orange.fr

Abstract

A novel gene editing procedure based on a nuclease from the Argonaute protein family was described in mid-2016 and appeared to provide significant advantages over the now widely used CRISPR-Cas9 system. Attempts by numerous groups to use this technique have however been unsuccessful; several negative reports have been published in addition to many accounts of failure found in the “grey literature”. It is unclear at this point whether this reflects an (unknown) critical experimental factor or hints at data misinterpretation, possibly even at outright fabrication of results.