This study finds that CRISPR-knockout phenotypes from genome-wide screens systematically show increased similarity to knockouts of unrelated genomically proximal genes located on the same chromosome arm. Multiple lines of evidence suggest that this proximity bias is caused by telomeric truncations of chromosome arms and is consistent across cell types, labs and Cas9 delivery methods.
- Nathan H. Lazar
- Safiye Celik
- Imran S. Haque