The establishment and development of gene knockout mice have provided powerful support for the study of gene function and the treatment of human diseases. Gene targeting and gene trap are two techniques for generating gene knockout mice from embryonic stem cells. Gene targeting replaces endogenous knockout gene by homologous recombination. There are two ways to knock out target genes: promoter trap and polyA trap. In recent years, many new gene knockout techniques have been developed, including Cre/loxP system, CRISP/Cas9 system, latest ZFN technology and TALEN technology. This article focuses on the several new knockout mouse techniques.
基因敲除小鼠技术的建立和发展使得人们为研究基因的功能和寻找新的治疗人类疾病的靶点提供了强有力的支持。基因打靶和基因捕获是两种通过胚胎干细胞 (Embryonic stem cell，ESC) 构建基因敲除小鼠的技术。基因打靶通过同源重组替换内源基因从而敲除目的基因，而基因捕获则有启动子捕获和polyA 捕获两种方法对目的基因进行敲除。近年来，有许多新的基因敲除技术不断被开发出来，包括Cre/loxP 系统、CRISP/Cas9系统以及最新的ZFN 技术和TAILEN 技术，都有望取代传统基因敲除手段。文中简要阐述了如今新出现的几种基因敲除小鼠技术。.
Keywords: embryonic stem cells; gene editing; gene knockout technology; gene targeting; homologous recombination.