A CRISPR system involving a different protein that has the ability to alter human DNA, and may work even better than Cas9 in some cases, has been found by gene-editing scientists. They have discovered the system at such a time when CRISPR/Cas9 was swept through biology labs.

Thus, this new genome-editing technique is no less than revolutionary. In fact, some rival groups, each claiming to be first to the tech, have been bitterly fighting for the CRISPR/Cas9 patent. This latest gene-editing protein, known as Cpf1, meant that a patent may not be so powerful.

CRISPR sequences belong to primordial immune systems, which are present in around 40% of bacteria and 90% of archaea.

In a study, published in Cell, Feng Zhang and colleagues searched through bacterial genomes to find different versions of Cpf1. They discovered two from Acidominococcus and Lachnospiraceae, and can snip DNA on getting inserted into human cells.

John van derOost, a microbiologist at Wageningen University and a co-author on the paper, said, “There are definitely many more defense systems out there, and maybe some of them might even have spectacular applications like with the Cas9 system. “We have the feeling it’s just the tip of the iceberg”.

Zhang and van derOost did the search purposefully, but CRISPR/Cas9’s initial discovery as a gene-editing tool was not. The microbiologists noticed odd repeating sequences in the DNA of bacteria in the 1980s, and those clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats turned into CRISPR. They then came to know that they were proof of an immune system bacteria used to fight viruses.