Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and University of Cambridge researchers have created sOPTiKO, a more efficient and controllable CRISPR genome editing platform. Today (29 November), in the journal Development, they describe how the freely available single-step system works in every cell in the body and at every stage of development. This new approach will aid researchers in developmental biology, tissue regeneration and cancer.

Kymab is a company founded on genetic technologies developed at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute by Professor Allan Bradley. Its focus is discovering, developing and delivering new monoclonal antibody medicines to treat a variety of diseases.

River blindness is a common chronic infectious neglected disease that blights many communities near water in remote areas of the Amazon basin in South America and in Africa. It is caused by the worm Onchocerca volvulus, whose larvae migrate through the body, including into the eyes of infected people, making them blind. The parasite is a major socioeconomic issue in the villages and families it affects because sufferers are no longer able to work. In addition other family members, often children, have to give up their studies or work to care for them, further depriving the family of income or future development.

Together these new buildings will house one of the world’s most advanced gene sequencing facilities and a unique innovation space for global genomics and biodata businesses. These buildings will be home to a powerful collaboration between academia, businesses large and small, charities and Government.

The papers reveal how variation in blood cells’ characteristics and numbers can affect a person’s risk of developing complex diseases such as heart disease, and autoimmune diseases including rheumatoid arthritis, asthma, coeliac disease and type 1 diabetes.

A multi-drug resistant infection that can cause life-threatening illness in people with cystic fibrosis (CF) and can spread from patient to patient has spread globally and is becoming increasingly virulent, according to new research published today in the journal Science.

Wellcome Genome Campus Connecting Science applied for the seeds so that they can grow their own Newton's Apple Tree under which they can share the Campus' science and stories with school children and the public.

Reporting in Lancet Infectious Diseases, scientists at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and their collaborators have discovered genetic markers in malaria parasites linked with resistance to piperaquine.

Scientists have measured the catastrophic genetic damage caused by smoking in different organs of the body and identified several different mechanisms by which tobacco smoking causes mutations in DNA. Researchers at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, the Los Alamos National Laboratory and their collaborators found smokers accumulated an average of 150 extra mutations in every lung cell for each year of smoking one packet of cigarettes a day.

Genome sequencing has revealed ancient gene mixing between chimpanzees and bonobos, mankind’s closest relatives, showing parallels with Neanderthal mixing in human ancestry. The study showed that 1% of chimpanzee genomes are derived from bonobos. It also found that genomics could aid chimpanzee conservation, by helping reveal the country of origin of individual chimpanzees.