Mining Bacteria for Tools
Omar Abudayyeh works on novel genome editing and gene delivery tools, and applying these tools towards the study of aging. While CRISPR is perhaps best known as a DNA editing tool, Abudayyeh’s team has discovered new CRISPR enzymes, such as the RNA-targeting CRISPR-Cas13, and adapted these enzymes for novel technologies, such as a simple and inexpensive tool to detect human disease. This technology, called SHERLOCK, can detect viruses, bacteria – even genetic signatures associated with cancer – in virtually any location. Abudayyeh and McGovern Fellow Jonathan Gootenberg continue to mine bacterial systems for new technologies to better enable gene therapy as well as applying these technologies towards studying mechanisms of aging.
Using next-generation single-cell sequencing and novel tools for perturbing cell states, Dr. Abudayyeh is determining, with unprecedented resolution, the cell types that arise in the aging brain and how mechanisms, such as senescence, drive detrimental processes in tissues. The ultimate goal is to use this information for building a detailed roadmap of aging circuits and to eventually reverse states of aging for regenerating tissues like the brain.
During his PhD, Abudayyeh focused on the development of molecular technologies for treating and sensing disease states, crossing disciplines and utilizing novel computational techniques, CRISPR biology, microbiology, biochemistry, and molecular biology. As a result, he and his co-authors uncovered and biochemically characterized novel CRISPR systems, including numerous classes of DNA targeting enzymes as well as the programmable RNA-targeting Cas13 . The team developed Cas13 into a toolbox for RNA perturbation tools, including RNA knockdown, imaging, base editing, and diagnostics. These tools have been disseminated and used by thousands of labs around the world.
Dr. Abudayyeh graduated from MIT in 2012 with a B.S. in mechanical engineering and biological engineering, where he was a Henry Ford II Scholar (top graduating engineer) and a Barry M. Goldwater Scholar. Omar Abudayyeh carried out undergraduate research thesis with Sangeeta Bhatia on non-invasive cancer diagnostics using nanoparticle sensors, then conducted his PhD work in Feng Zhang’s lab at the McGovern Institute and Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. He is one of the first members of the McGovern Institute Fellows program, which supports the transition to independent research for exceptional recent PhD graduates.
Honors and Awards
Forbes 30 Under 30, 2018
Business Insider 30 under 30, 2018
TEDMED Hive Innovator, 2017
NIH- Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (F30), 2016
National Defense Science and Engineering Fellowship, 2016
National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, 2014
Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow, 2013