CRISPRkit aims to make “gene editing accessible for everyone, everywhere.” Aimed at K-12 students and people of any age curious about the how the revolutionary CRISPR gene-editing works, the DIY kits cost just $2 a piece (about $40 for a classroom). “Our mission is to democratize the tool that enables us to rewrite the code of life,” declares the founders at the CRISPRkit website.
The advent of CRISPRkit is a measure of just how we have come in just eight years when Stanford University infectious disease expert Dr. David Relman warned, “I do not think that we want an unregulated, non-overseen community of freelance practitioners of this technology.” Relman and others were concerned about the rising DIYBio movement, as exemplified by direct-to-consumer CRISPR editing packages such as those offered by The ODIN company (founded by biohacker Jo Zayner). Back in 2018, I used an ODIN kit to gene-edit some bacteria in my kitchen.
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