According to Professor Jacob Corn, we are standing on the threshold of major medical breakthroughs: thanks to advances in the field of genome editing, it may be possible in future to heal genetic diseases as easily as broken bones. Corn, who has been Professor of Genome Biology at ETH Zurich since 2018, researches how damage to the genetic material of DNA can be identified and repaired by editing, replacing or switching on or off individual genes.
For Jacob Corn, it is clear that new genome editing technologies will revolutionize the research and treatment of genetic diseases. And for researchers, it is equally clear that much more basic research is still required before this technology can be utilized for humans. But how advanced is the technology currently and what opportunities does it offer? Professor Corn discussed these questions during yesterday’s inaugural lecture entitled “CRISPR-Cas genome editing, from mechanism to therapy,” which will be uploaded on the ETH-Videoportal.
