Emily P. Bentley

Emily P. Bentley is a Blog Writer at Addgene. She earned her PhD in molecular biology and biophysics from Scripps Research, and she loves supporting open science and learning about new research.

Blog articles by Emily P. Bentley

A team of 20 high school students in matching t shirts, along with their teacher.
A photo of three people holding and touching a tray of small plants that are either bright green or dark purple.
A cartoon showing a simplified Cas9 and gRNA binding to DNA. The 3’ end of the gRNA is the scaffold sequence, bound by Cas9, where some DNA substitution is tolerated. The 20 bases on the 5’ end of the gRNA are the spacer sequence, which hybridizes with the genomic DNA, base pairing to the target strand.   The non-target strand of genomic DNA includes the same sequence as the spacer. The PAM consists of the three bases immediately 3’ of this spacer-matching sequence.  Within the gRNA spacer, the 3’ half is the seed sequence, where no DNA substitution is tolerated. The 5’ half, also the 5’ end of the entire gRNA, is the tail sequence, where DNA substitution is tolerated.
A cartoon of four cells, all carrying a different plasmid. Each cell glows a different color, matching the plasmid it carries.
A smiling Blugene holds DNA
Cartoon of CRISPR-associated transposase (CAST) integrating donor DNA into a genomic target site.
A cartoon plasmid at the center of the image has arrows leading to many possible host species: gram negative bacteria, gram positive bacteria, yeast, and mammalian cells.

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