Craig Montell interviewed on KCBX on gene editing to create sterile male mosquitoes to fight disease

August 23, 2021

KCBX radio (NPR) interviewed Craig Montell on June 9, 2021 (https://www.kcbx.org/post/ucsb-gene-editing-mosquitos-could-fight-disease-raises-ethical-environmental-questions#stream/0) on the breakthrough in using gene-editing CRISPR-Cas9 technology to create sterile male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. This method of targeting a specific gene tied to fertility in male mosquitoes — called “sterile insect technique,” or SIT — could control the population of Aedes aegypti without pesticides. The interview is based on a paper by Jieyan Chen et al in PNAS published in June 2021, entitled, "Suppression of female fertility in Aedes aegypti with a CRISPR-targeted male-sterile mutation" (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34031258/).

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