AUTHOR=Shaytan A. K. , Novikov R. V. , Vinnikov R. S. , Gribkova A. K. , Glukhov G. S. TITLE=From DNA-protein interactions to the genetic circuit design using CRISPR-dCas systems JOURNAL=Frontiers in Molecular Biosciences VOLUME=9 YEAR=2022 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/molecular-biosciences/articles/10.3389/fmolb.2022.1070526 DOI=10.3389/fmolb.2022.1070526 ISSN=2296-889X ABSTRACT=

In the last decade, the CRISPR-Cas technology has gained widespread popularity in different fields from genome editing and detecting specific DNA/RNA sequences to gene expression control. At the heart of this technology is the ability of CRISPR-Cas complexes to be programmed for targeting particular DNA loci, even when using catalytically inactive dCas-proteins. The repertoire of naturally derived and engineered dCas-proteins including fusion proteins presents a promising toolbox that can be used to construct functional synthetic genetic circuits. Rational genetic circuit design, apart from having practical relevance, is an important step towards a deeper quantitative understanding of the basic principles governing gene expression regulation and functioning of living organisms. In this minireview, we provide a succinct overview of the application of CRISPR-dCas-based systems in the emerging field of synthetic genetic circuit design. We discuss the diversity of dCas-based tools, their properties, and their application in different types of genetic circuits and outline challenges and further research directions in the field.