"Phage-encoded single-guide RNAs subvert
#CRISPR-Cas9 immunity"
Maximilian Feussner, Angela Migur, Jinquan Li [..] Zasha Weinberg, Rafael Pinilla-Redondo, Peter C. Fineran, Chase L. Beisel [ 5]
bioRxiv 2026-06-02 (preprint).
doi.org/10.64898/2026.06.01.…
Central to CRISPR technologies is the single-guide RNA (sgRNA), an engineered fusion of a processed CRISPR RNA and tracrRNA.
Bacteriophages encode similarly compact viral sgRNAs (vsgRNAs) that counteract bacterial CRISPR-Cas9 immunity.
Even: vsgRNAs can enable genome editing in mammalian cells, offering a natural guide RNA template for CRISPR technologies.