(Yicai Global) Oct. 24 -- Scientists in China recently said that they have made a new type of lean hog with 24 percent fat less using Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) genome editing technology.

Zhao Jianguo from the Chinese Academy of Sciences-Institute of Zoology led the project and his corresponding article appeared in the new Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The key technology Zhao's team used is clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR). These are segments of prokaryotic DNA containing short repetitions of base sequences.

The team inserted a gene called UCP1 able to reduce fat deposits while scaling up the lean meat percentage, and thus the cultured hogs had 24 percent less fat than a conventional pig.

"Our success facilitates further cultivation of new hog breeds and validates the concept of altering hog size and characteristics with CRISPR."