Back to the drawing board.

It's a deceivingly simple question--one that has consumed geneticists' minds for nearly four decades now (circa 1970). How to edit any gene. Last year, someone found the answer.

 Feng Zhang claimed the "biggest biotech discovery of the century" when he created CRISPR/Cas9 technology for highly-specific, in vivo gene editing. Don't be surprised when he wins a Nobel Prize.

Zhang focused on this completely novel, niche solution while most of science--including myself--looked at popular research on engineered nucleases including ZFNs and TALENs. Over the last year, CRISPRs made huge strides, moving rapidly from editing human cells in lab to reversing diseases in living organisms. Meanwhile, I finally got approved to have keyless access to my new lab.

So now, I'm working on rewording the question I initially asked. We now know how to edit any gene. Now, what do we do with that? Answer coming at you guys in a couple weeks.