US scientists have repurposed genetic modification technology CRISPR to identify antibodies in patient blood samples in a move that could inspire a new class of medical diagnostics, particularly in the treatment of Covid-19.

The technology involves customisable collections of proteins which are attached to a variant of Cas9, the protein at the heart of CRISPR, that will bind to DNA but not cut it as it would when used for genetic modification. When these Cas9-fused proteins are applied to a microchip sporting thousands of unique DNA molecules, each protein within the mixture will self-assemble to the position on the chip containing its corresponding DNA sequence.