US (MO): New company wants to spearhead gene editing for growers

Cut, Paste, Grow: Spearhead Bio Emerges to Transform Crop Genome Engineering with Nature-Inspired Tool

A powerful new player has entered the field of agricultural biotechnology. Spearhead Bio, launched today by the Danforth Technology Company (DTC), aims to accelerate and improve crop genome engineering using a proprietary technology known as TAHITI—short for Transposase Assisted Homology Independent Targeted Insertion.AgTech

SpearHead Bio Offers Precise Plant Engineering Using CRISPR-Directed Jumping Genes

Keith Slotkin, PhD, first became interested in transposable elements (TE), colloquially known as “jumping genes,” as an undergraduate student. “They just broke all the rules,” he said in an interview with GEN. “They have totally different regulation and inheritance, and they’re highly dynamic.”  In his lab at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, Slotkin has studied these genomic elements in depth in plants. What ultimately piqued his attent…

US (MO): New company wants to spearhead gene editing for growers

A new agtech company focused on enhancing gene editing for plants has launched in St. Louis, the Danforth Technology Company announced Tuesday morning. The company, Spearhead Bio, is the third startup in three years to spin out from the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, and aims to complement…