Friday Squid Blogging: We’re Genetically Engineering Squid Now
Is this a good idea? The transparent squid is a genetically altered version of the hummingbird bobtail squid, a species usually found in the tropical waters from Indonesia to China and Japan. It’s typically smaller than a thumb and shaped like a dumpling. And like other cephalopods, it has a relatively large and sophisticated brain. The see-through version is made possible by a gene editing technology called CRISPR, which became popular nearly a decade ago. Albertin and Rosenthal thought they might be able to use CRISPR to create a special squid for research. They focused on the hummingbird bobtail squid [...]