MicroRNA (miRNA) sponges are RNA transcripts containing multiple high-affinity binding sites that associate with and sequester specific miRNAs to prevent them from interacting with their target messenger (m)RNAs.
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Genetic Engineering Publications - GEG Tech top picks
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BigField GEG Tech's insight:
In a paper published in Science, Silas et al. now report that a subset of CRISPR systems has the ability to acquire spacers not only from DNA but from RNA as well. The team concludes that the acquisition of RNA spacers by type III CRISPR systems may enable the targeting of parasitic RNA species, such as RNA phages, and may contribute to immune responses towards highly transcribed regions of DNA phages and plasmids via an interference system targeting DNA, RNA or both. In addition, the authors highlight the possibility that RNA spacer acquisition could also occur in species that have seperately encoded RT and Cas1 proteins. 
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BigField GEG Tech's insight:
In this work, the authors used the CRISPR system to target HIV and suppresse HIV-1 replication. They demonstrated that many of these indels are indeed lethal for the virus, but that others lead to the emergence of replication competent viruses that are resistant to Cas9/sgRNA. This observation illustrates two opposite outcomes of Cas9/sgRNA action, i.e., inactivation of HIV-1 and acceleration of viral escape, thereby potentially limiting the use of Cas9/sgRNA in HIV-1 therapy.
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In this study, the scientists introduce microRNA sponge generator and tester (miRNAsong), a freely available web-based tool for generation and in silico testing of miRNA sponges. This tool generates miRNA sponge constructs for specific miRNAs and miRNA families/clusters and tests them for potential binding to miRNAs in selected organisms. Currently, miRNAsong allows for testing of sponge constructs in 219 species covering 35,828 miRNA sequences.