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Zinc Fingers: Business Meets Science

A look at the costs of accessing zinc finger nucleases for research.

By Rachael Moeller Gorman // Fall 2010

$30,000
Approximate full price for a set of two customized zinc finger nucleases

$100
Approximate cost charged by the Zinc Finger Consortium for each zinc finger pool, which scientists can then use to create ZFNs

9
Approximate time, in months, required to master the technique for creating ZFNs with the Zinc Finger Consortium’s pools and protocol

6
Number of academic labs that have successfully made their own ZFNs in the past two years

81
Number of “families” of patents owned or co-owned by Sangamo BioSciences

2019
Year some of these patents may expire

Zinc fingers could pull gene therapy back from the brink—but only if more researchers can get their hands on the remarkable proteins.

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