CRISPR off-target errors

A CRISPR spin-off causes unintended typos in DNA

Even the best editor sometimes introduces typos. That’s true whether the editor is human or a version of the much-heralded gene-editing tool CRISPR.

One type of CRISPR gene editor that changes individual DNA bases, rather than cutting DNA, introduces more unwanted mutations than expected in mouse embryos and rice plants, researchers report. Those mistakes occurred in places where the tool wasn’t supposed to make changes. Another tested base editor, however, didn’t make the undesirable edits. The results were described in two studies published online February 28 in Science.

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More machine learning making models...

Sberbank creates algorithm to do data scientists' job

It seems that even data scientists are not immune to the corrosive impact of artificial intelligence on the jobs market. Russia's Sberbank claims to have created an algorithm - Auto ML (machine learning) - that "acts like a data scientist", creating its own models that then solve application tasks.

The bank carried out its first pilot in January, using Auto ML algos to create several baseline models to help with the targeting of sales campaigns.

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