# Exploring Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats-CRISPR-Associated Protein 9 (CRISPR-Cas9) as a Therapeutic Modality for Cancer: A Scoping Review

## TL;DR

This review explores how CRISPR-Cas9, a gene-editing tool, can be used to treat cancer by precisely modifying genes, while also discussing its challenges and ethical concerns.

## Contribution

The paper provides a comprehensive overview of CRISPR-Cas9's therapeutic potential and challenges in cancer treatment.

## Key findings

- CRISPR-Cas9 offers precise gene editing for cancer therapy through knockout and base editing.
- Challenges include off-target effects, delivery inefficiency, and ethical concerns.
- CRISPR outperforms other gene-editing tools like zinc-finger nucleases.

## Abstract

The global burden of cancer and the limitations of conventional therapies highlight the potential of clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats-CRISPR-associated protein 9 (CRISPR-Cas9) in reshaping cancer treatment paradigms. In this review, we have investigated the mechanism of CRISPR, an adaptive immune system in bacteria that enables highly precise gene editing at the molecular level. This versatile tool demonstrates its efficacy in human cancer therapy through gene knockout, metabolic disruption, base editing, screening, and immunotherapy enhancement without affecting normal bodily domains. Despite its superiority over other nucleases like zinc-finger nucleases and transcription activator-like effector nucleases, hurdles such as off-target effects, inefficient delivery of the system to target cells, the emergence of escapers, and the ethical debate surrounding genome editing are discussed. In this article, we have reviewed the promising approaches of CRISPR-Cas9 in cancer treatment while exploring the underlying mechanism, advantages, and associated challenges.