“Inactivation of Porcine Endogenous Retrovirus in Pigs Using CRISPR-Cas9”, Dong Niu, HongJiang Wei, Lin Lin, Haydy George, Tao Wang, IHsiu Lee, HongYe Zhao, Yong Wang, Yinan Kan, Ellen Shrock, Emal Lesha, Gang Wang, Yonglun Luo, Yubo Qing, Deling Jiao, Heng Zhao, Xiaoyang Zhou, Shouqi Wang, Hong Wei, Marc Gell, George M. Church, Luhan Yang2017-08-10 (; backlinks; similar)⁠:

Xenotransplantation is a promising strategy to alleviate the shortage of organs for human transplantation. In addition to the concern on pig-to-human immunological compatibility, the risk of cross-species transmission of porcine endogenous retroviruses (PERVs) has impeded the clinical application of this approach. Earlier, we demonstrated the feasibility of inactivating PERV activity in an immortalized pig cell line.

Here, we confirmed that PERVs infect human cells, and observed the horizontal transfer of PERVs among human cells.

Using CRISPR-Cas9, we inactivated all the PERVs in a porcine primary cell line and generated PERV-inactivated pigs via somatic cell nuclear transfer.

Our study highlighted the value of PERV inactivation to prevent cross-species viral transmission and demonstrated the successful production of PERV-inactivated animals to address the safety concern in clinical xenotransplantation.

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Inactivation of Porcine Endogenous Retrovirus in Pigs Using CRISPR-Cas9