{"entity":{"id":"in-vivo-gene-editing-cancer","kind":"technology","name":"In vivo base and prime editing for cancer","aka":[],"tldr":"In vivo base and prime editing would rewrite a cancer's DNA letter by letter inside the body. It works in the liver for inherited disease; nobody has yet corrected a cancer this way in a person.","summary":"Base editors change a single DNA letter without cutting; prime editors write short new sequences. Both are in the clinic for inherited liver and blood disease, and base editing is used ex vivo to build allogeneic CAR-T cells. Direct in vivo correction of a cancer driver, restoring TP53 or disabling a mutant KRAS allele, had not entered human trials by September 2026: solid-tumour delivery, editing every malignant cell, and the fact that a corrected cell must still out-compete an uncorrected one are all unsolved.","status":"concept","asOf":"2026-09-08","links":[{"label":"ClinicalTrials.gov: base editing studies","url":"https://clinicaltrials.gov/search?term=base%20editing"}],"tags":["frontier","radical"],"related":[],"cancers":[],"sections":["targeted-therapy","drug-discovery"],"technologies":["crispr-screens","in-vivo-car-t","programmable-dna-targeting-therapeutics"],"targets":["tp53","kras"],"drugs":[],"companies":[],"institutions":[],"pathways":[],"terms":[],"trials":[],"people":[],"bottlenecks":[],"keyPapers":[],"journals":[],"dependsOn":[],"notes":[],"principle":"A catalytically impaired Cas protein fused to a deaminase or reverse transcriptase is guided to a locus and edits it without a double-strand break; delivered by lipid nanoparticle or virus.","strengths":["Acts on the causal lesion, not a downstream protein","No double-strand breaks, so fewer translocations than nuclease editing","Re-programmable by changing the guide"],"limitations":["No in vivo oncology trial yet (2026)","Delivery reaches liver far better than solid tumours","Editing a fraction of cells may not change tumour behaviour","Off-target edits are permanent"]},"route":"/technologies/in-vivo-gene-editing-cancer/","neighbours":{"section":[{"id":"drug-discovery","kind":"section","name":"Drug Discovery Platforms","route":"/fronts/drug-discovery/"},{"id":"targeted-therapy","kind":"section","name":"Targeted Therapy","route":"/fronts/targeted-therapy/"}],"technology":[{"id":"crispr-screens","kind":"technology","name":"CRISPR functional genomics","route":"/technologies/crispr-screens/"},{"id":"in-vivo-car-t","kind":"technology","name":"In vivo CAR-T","route":"/technologies/in-vivo-car-t/"},{"id":"programmable-dna-targeting-therapeutics","kind":"technology","name":"Programmable DNA-targeting therapeutics","route":"/technologies/programmable-dna-targeting-therapeutics/"}],"target":[{"id":"kras","kind":"target","name":"KRAS","route":"/targets/kras/"},{"id":"tp53","kind":"target","name":"TP53","route":"/targets/tp53/"}],"roadmap":[{"id":"frontier-2035","kind":"roadmap","name":"Radical oncology: what could change the war by 2035","route":"/roadmaps/frontier-2035/"}]}}