Open AccessAdvances and challenges in genetic technologies to produce single-sex litters
Author(s) -
Charlotte Douglas,
James M. A. Turner
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
plos genetics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.587
H-Index - 233
eISSN - 1553-7404
pISSN - 1553-7390
DOI - 10.1371/journal.pgen.1008898
Subject(s) - biology , crispr , genome editing , cas9 , culling , computational biology , genome , genetics , gene , ecology , herd
There is currently a requirement for single-sex litters for many applications, including agriculture, pest control, and reducing animal culling in line with the 3Rs principles: Reduction, Replacement, and Refinement. The advent of CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing presents a new opportunity with which to potentially generate all-female or all-male litters. We review some of the historical nongenetic strategies employed to generate single-sex litters and investigate how genetic and genome editing techniques are currently being used to produce all-male or all-female progeny. Lastly, we speculate on future technologies for generating single-sex litters and the possible associated challenges.