You may have seen the headlines about CRISPR/Cas9, a powerful genetic technique that lets scientists "edit" genes.
It's been hailed as a miracle method that will cure disease, and also as the nefarious technology that will bring about the era of "designer babies."
CRISPR, which stands for "clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats," is a defense mechanism that evolved in bacteria, but has been adapted for use in many other organisms, including humans. It functions like a genetic "find-and-replace" algorithm, letting scientists go in and edit genes inside living cells.
But how did the technique come about? Here's a timeline of some of the main developments:
NEXT UP: Scientists may soon be able to 'cut and paste' DNA to cure deadly diseases and design perfect babies
SEE ALSO: CRISPR, the gene-editing tech that's making headlines, explained in one graphic
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NOW WATCH: Watch science writer Carl Zimmer explain CRISPR in 90 seconds