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Scientist · Microbiology

Francisco Mojica

Microbiologist who recognised what CRISPR sequences actually were, and who gave the system its name.

CRISPR discovery

Simple explanation

Long before anyone thought of CRISPR as a tool, Francisco Mojica was studying strange repeating patterns in the DNA of salt-loving microbes. He worked out that the sequences between the repeats came from viruses — meaning the microbes were keeping a genetic record of infections they had survived. That insight is what made everything afterwards possible, and he coined the acronym CRISPR.

Go deeper

Francisco Mojica, at the University of Alicante, characterised clustered repeat arrays in archaea from the 1990s and in 2005 published the recognition that spacer sequences derived from bacteriophage and plasmid DNA, proposing an adaptive immune function. He proposed the CRISPR acronym. His work is the conceptual origin of the field and is frequently omitted from popular accounts that begin in 2012.

Sources

Written by The CRISPR Atlas editorial team Last updated Aug 25, 2026

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Technologies

CRISPR-Cas9

Research

Intervening sequences of regularly spaced prokaryotic repeats derive from foreign genetic elements
Educational information only This page is a reference, not medical advice. Research and regulatory status change; check the last-updated date above and confirm anything important against the primary sources listed.