Inducible Genome Editing with Conditional CRISPR/Cas9 Mice

Genetically engineered mouse models (GEMMs) are powerful tools by which to probe gene function in vivo , obtain insight into disease etiology, and identify modifiers of drug response. Increased sophistication of GEMMs has led to the design of tissue-specific and inducible models in which genes of interest are expressed or ablated in defined tissues or cellular subtypes. Here we describe the generation of a transgenic mouse harboring a doxycycline-regulated Cas9 allele for inducible genome engineering. This model provides a flexible platform for genome engineering since editing is achieved by exogenous delivery of sgRNAs and should allow for the modeling of a range of biological and pathological processes.