Cotton trait stacking success announced

Precision BioSciences Inc., announced that research, The Bayer Scientific Magazine, has published an article describing the successful use of Precision’s DNE technology to modify the genome of cotton. The article describes pioneering work performed by Kathleen D’Halluin and her colleagues at Bayer CropScience, who used an engineered DNE meganuclease produced by Precision to insert a gene into cotton. In doing so, D’Halluin was able to produce a “trait stack” in which two genes conferring valuable traits were targeted to the same location in the cotton genome. This is the first time that a gene editing approach, such as DNE, has been used successfully in cotton. Precision’s patent-protected technology provides plant researchers with exquisite control over a plant genome and offers enormous improvements in breeding efficiency.

“We are enormously pleased with the results published by Bayer CropScience,” said Jeff Smith, Precision BioSciences’ Chief Scientific Officer. “Cotton is a notoriously difficult plant to manipulate and we expect DNE to play an important role in the genetic modification of such recalcitrant crop species.”

“Precision’s long-standing focus on the development of the world's premier genome editing technology is continuing to pay off,” said Precision BioSciences CEO Matthew Kane. “We look forward to solving future unmet genome engineering challenges requiring the levels of precision that only DNE allows.”

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