In an exciting scientific first, researchers from around 29 universities and institutions across North America have teamed up to create a large, versatile, and effective arsenal of new biological tools that will play a critical role in the battle against brain disease. The tools are known as enhancer AAV vectors.
Scientists at the Allen Institute successfully created over 1000 of them, and each consist of:
A harmless Adeno-associated virus (or AAV) that acts like a shuttle capable of transporting specially designed DNA into the cell.
A segment of DNA (the enhancer) that acts like an “activation switch” to mark or trigger a change in how the cell functions.
