The Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) and CRISPR- associated (Cas) system is the latest addition to the genome editing toolbox, offering a simple, rapid, and efficient solution. Derived from components of a simple bacterial immune system, the CRISPR-Cas9 system permits targeted gene cleavage and gene editing in a variety of eukaryotic cells, and because the endonuclease cleavage specificity in CRISPR-Cas9 system is guided by RNA sequences, editing can be directed to virtually any genomic locus by engineering the guide RNA sequence and delivering it along with the Cas endonuclease to your target cell. The CRISPR-Cas9 system has great promise in broad applications such as stem cell engineering, gene therapy, tissue and animal disease models, and engineering disease-resistant transgenic plants.