In the opening keynote talk in GEN’s “The State of CRISPR & Genome Editing” virtual summit, originally broadcast on June 11, 2025, Feng Zhang, PhD, Core Institute Member of the Broad Institute and an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, delivered a superb lecture featuring three vignettes from his lab’s ongoing research.
In the first two, Zhang discussed new delivery platforms for gene editing and gene therapy: one involves endogenous capsid proteins, the other prokaryotic injection systems. The third story looked at new RNA-programmable systems known as TIGR (tandem interspaced guide RNA) array.
Zhang’s presentation was entitled: “Exploration of Natural Diversity for Human Health.” He is the cofounder of several biotech companies, including Editas Medicine, Beam Therapeutics, Pairwise, and Aera Therapeutics.
“Nature is incredibly inventive,” Zhang told GEN deputy editor-in-chief Julianna LeMieux, PhD, following his talk. Bacteria and their phage, “are full of mysteries and also lots of really powerful mechanisms that we can study and potentially harness.”
The entire virtual summit is available to watch free on demand: bit.ly/CRISPR25
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