CRISPR-Cas9 Off-Target Analysis

For U2OS.EGFP and K562 cells, 2 × 10⁵ cells were transfected with 250 ng of sgRNA expression plasmid or an empty U6 promoter plasmid (for negative controls), 750 ng of Cas9 expression plasmid, and 30 ng of td-Tomato expression plasmid using the 4D Nucleofector System according to the manufacturer’s instructions (Lonza). For HEK293 cells, 1.65 × 10⁵ cells were transfected with 125 ng of sgRNA expression plasmid or an empty U6 promoter plasmid (for the negative control), 375 ng of Cas9 expression plasmid, and 30 ng of a td-Tomato expression plasmid using Lipofectamine LTX reagent according to the manufacturer’s instructions (Life Technologies). Genomic DNA was harvested from transfected U2OS.EGFP, HEK293, or K562 cells using the QIAamp DNA Blood Mini Kit (QIAGEN), according to the manufacturer’s instructions. To generate enough genomic DNA to amplify the off-target candidate sites, DNA from three Nucleofections (for U2OS.EGFP cells), two Nucleofections (for K562 cells), or two Lipofectamine LTX transfections was pooled together before performing T7EI. This was done twice for each condition tested, thereby generating duplicate pools of genomic DNA representing a total of four or six individual transfections. PCR was then performed using these genomic DNAs as templates as described above and purified using Ampure XP beads (Agencourt) according to the manufacturer’s instructions. T7EI assays were performed as previously described¹⁵ .