Horizon Discovery Launches New Gene Editing Tools and Services

Horizon Discovery™ Group plc today announced the launch of its full range of GENASSIST™ gene editing kits, reagents and support services that enable easier, robust implementation of gene editing experiments with CRISPR and rAAV. GENASSIST offers a broad range of thoroughly validated tools alongside a suite of services designed to enable any cell line generation project to be efficiently addressed.

The company has designed GENASSIST to make genome editing accessible for everyone. Horizon offers not just plasmids for CRISPR gene editing, but also custom guide RNA design and validation (to provide customers with confidence that they are working with a suitably active guide); custom donor design and manufacturing; QuickStart cell lines that constitutively produce Cas9 nickase; over 550 X-MAN™ cell lines ready for further modification; and direct access to Horizon’s expert gene-editing scientists.  

By taking a technology agnostic approach that employs both CRISPR and rAAV gene editing technologies, Horizon is able to not only work with researchers to suggest the right approach for their specific project needs, but is also in the unique position of being able to combine the technologies to achieve efficiencies not possible with one technology alone.

“Horizon’s success has been driven by the way we partner with our customers. By offering access to our gene editing expertise we give researchers the best chance of success in their gene editing projects,” said Eric Rhodes, VP of R&D and Chief Technology Officer, Horizon Discovery. “Our new GENASSIST range of tools and services, combined with access to rAAV, ZFN, and CRISPR technologies, gives researchers an invaluable resource to determine the function of endogenous gene alterations and their effect on disease and therapeutic responses.”

Dr Darrin M Disley, CEO, Horizon Discovery, commented: “Horizon’s goal is to make the latest developments in gene editing accessible to the wider scientific audience. As the only company which can offer both nuclease techniques in the form of CRISPR or ZFN and homologous recombination harnessing rAAV, we are ensuring that researchers can make an informed choice of which technology or combination of technologies is best in order to gain the answer to the biological question being asked.”