Engineered hypercompact Fanzor-ωRNA system with enhanced genome editing activity

As programmable RNA-guided DNA nucleases found in eukaryotes, Fanzors have shown promise in genome editing with their compact size. A wide variety of RuvC-containing Fanzor nucleases have been identified in various eukaryotes and their viruses. However, low editing efficiency limits the application of Fanzor in mammalian genome editing. In this study, we introduce SpuFz1 V4, an engineered RNA-guided DNA endonuclease with vigorous editing activity in the human genome. Furthermore, we demonstrate the substantial potential of the Fanzor system as a base editor. SpuFz1 V4 is currently the most active RNA-guided DNA nuclease of eukaryotic origin, belonging to the Fanzor1 family. Due to its compact size, SpuFz1 V4 can be efficiently delivered via a single adeno-associated virus (AAV) into the retina, achieving robust in vivo genome editing, which has the potential to be applied in both basic research and disease treatment applications.