Chimeric crRNAs with 19 DNA residues in the guide region show the retained DNA cleavage activity of Cas9 with potential to improve the specificity

Abstract

We demonstrated that 19 out of 20 RNA residues in the guide region of crRNA can be replaced with DNA residues with high GC-contents. The cellular activity of the chimeric crRNAs to disrupt the target gene was comparable to that of the native crRNA.