The price of sequencing a human genome is about to plummet. A company called Complete Genomics, based in Mountain View, California, says it can read entire human genomes at $5000 a shot. Genome sequencing falls to $5000
Peter Aldhous
When James Watson – co-discoverer of the DNA double-helix – became the first individual to have his genome sequenced, in 2007, the cost was around $1 million. But several companies are now working on advanced technologies to allow faster and cheaper sequencing.
Last year, for instance, Applied Biosystems of Foster City, California, announced that it had sequenced the genome of a Nigerian man for less than $60,000.
Complete Genomics says it can beat that cost by more than a factor of 10, and it is putting its business plan where its mouth is: companies and academic researchers will be able to start placing orders at the quoted $5000 price tag from June this year.
Try before you buy
When New Scientist interviewed Watson in 2007, he predicted a revolution in understanding human genetic variation once reading each person's genome "gets down to the cost of a Chevrolet".Complete Genomics' sequences will be cheaper than many second-hand cars, and prospective customers can now kick the tyres of the company's product – CG's first human genome sequence has been released on its website.
The initial genome sequence, announced on 5 February at the Advances in Genome Biology and Technology meeting on Marco Island, Florida, is from a blood sample collected in 1980 from a 63-year-old man from Utah. "This is as good a quality genome as has ever been produced," claims Clifford Reid, the company's president. There is scope for improvement, however, as meeting attendees have noted that the technology has problems dealing with repetitive DNA sequences.
The company's technology relies on immobilising amplified fragments of DNA on a high-density silicon array, so that the fragments' sequences can be read quickly and efficiently. To do this, circles of DNA about 230 bases long are copied multiple times to form "nanoballs" that stick to the array.
Price no barrier
The first customers are likely to be academic researchers interested in uncovering the genetic roots of complex conditions such as cardiovascular disease, and drug firms that want to understand how genetic variation affects people's responses to their products.But as prices continue to come down, the technology could also be attractive to companies that are already offering more limited genome scans to members of the public. Such companies are currently studying up to a million single-letter variants in the genetic code known as single nucleotide polymorphisms.
Sean George, chief operating officer of Navigenics in Redwood Shores, California, expects his company to start offering genome sequencing to its customers by early next year – although no decision has yet been taken about which technology they will use.
So far, personal genome sequencing has been the preserve of the super-rich. Knome of Cambridge, Massachusetts, today offers the service for $99,500, through a contract with a team at the Beijing Genomics Institute in China.
X-Prize potential
One of Knome's founders is George Church, a specialist in sequencing technology at the Harvard Medical School in Boston, who is also an adviser to Complete Genomics. Discussions are underway between the two firms.Still, Knome president Jorge Conde warns that the price to its customers will remain higher than the basic cost of sequencing a genome, as much of the value comes from the expert analysis needed to interpret the sequence. "The average person cannot speak the language of As, Cs, Gs, and Ts," he says.
If Complete Genomics delivers as promised, the company could also be eligible for the Archon X Prize for Genomics, which will give $10 million for the first team to sequence 100 human genomes in less than 10 days for less than $10,000 each.
Complete Genomics has not yet entered the competition, however, as it intends to concentrate on fulfilling commercial orders. The company aims to sequence up to 1000 human genomes in 2009, and 20,000 in 2010.
“You wait till Larry comes and I tell him my theory!” The bids, duly sealed, were given into the keeping of the commissary officer to be put in his safe, and kept until the day of judgment, when all being opened in public and in the presence of the aspirants, the lowest would[Pg 188] get the contract. It was a simple plan, and gave no more opportunity for underhand work than could be avoided. But there were opportunities for all that. It was barely possible—the thing had been done—for a commissary clerk or sergeant, desirous of adding to his pittance of pay, or of favoring a friend among the bidders, to tamper with the bids. By the same token there was no real reason why the commissary officer could not do it himself. Landor had never heard, or known, of such a case, but undoubtedly the way was there. It was a question of having the will and the possession of the safe keys. "Well, I believe our boys 's all right. They're green, and they're friskier than colts in a clover field, but they're all good stuff, and I believe we kin stand off any ordinary gang o' guerrillas. I'll chance it, anyhow. This's a mighty valuable train to risk, but it ought to go through, for we don't know how badly they may need it. You tell your engineer to go ahead carefully and give two long whistles if he sees anything dangerous." "Fine-looking lot of youngsters," he remarked. "They'll make good soldiers." "That's just what he was, the little runt, and we had the devil's own time finding him. What in Sam Hill did the Captain take him for, I'd like to know? Co. Q aint no nursery. Well, the bugler up at Brigade Headquarters blowed some sort of a call, and Skidmore wanted to know what it meant. They told him that it was an order for the youngest man in each company to come up there and get some milk for his coffee tomorrow morning, and butter for his bread. There was only enough issued for the youngest boys, and if he wanted his share he'd have to get a big hustle on him, for the feller whose nose he'd put out o' joint 'd try hard to get there ahead o' him, and get his share. So Skidmore went off at a dead run toward the sound of the bugle, with the boys looking after him and snickering. But he didn't come back at roll-call, nor at tattoo, and the smart Alecks begun to get scared, and abuse each other for setting up a job on a poor, innocent little boy. Osc Brewster and Ol Perry, who had been foremost in the trick had a fight as to which had been to blame. Taps come, and he didn't get back, and then we all became scared. I'd sent Jim Hunter over to Brigade Headquarters to look for him, but he came back, and said they hadn't seen anything of him there. Then I turned out the whole company to look for him. Of course, them too-awfully smart galoots of Co. A had to get very funny over our trouble. They asked why we didn't get the right kind of nurses for our company, that wouldn't let the members stray out of their sight? Why we didn't call the children in when the chickens went to roost, undress 'em, and tuck 'em in their little beds, and sing to 'em after they'd said 'Now I lay me down to sleep?' I stood it all until that big, hulking Pete Nasmith came down with a camp-kettle, which he was making ring like a bell, as he yelled out, 'Child lost! Child lost!' Behind him was Tub Rawlings singing, 'Empty's the cradle, baby's gone.' Then I pulled off my blouse and slung it into my tent, and told 'em there went my chevrons, and I was simply Scott Ralston, and able to lick any man in Co. A. One o' their Lieutenants came out and ordered them back to their quarters, and I deployed the company in a skirmish-line, and started 'em through the brush toward Brigade Headquarters. About three-quarters o' the way Osc Brewster and Ol Perry, when going through a thicket, heard a boy boo-hooing. They made their way to him, and there was little Skidmore sitting on a stump, completely confused and fagged out. He'd lost his way, and the more he tried to find it the worse he got turned around. They called out to him, and he blubbered out: 'Yes, it's me; little Pete Skidmore. Them doddurned fools in my company 've lost me, just as I've bin tellin' 'em right along they would, durn 'em.' Osc and Ol were so tickled at finding him that they gathered him up, and come whooping back to camp, carrying him every step of the way." And the rush stopped. Cadnan waited for a second, but there was no more. "Dara is not to die," he said. Then he saw Orion hanging over him, very low in the windy sky, shaking with frost. His eyes fixed themselves on the constellation, then gradually he became aware of the sides of a cart, of the smell of straw, of the movement of other bodies that sighed and stirred beside him. The physical experience was now complete, and soon the emotional had shaped itself. Memory came, rather sick. He remembered the fight, his terror, the flaming straw, the crowd that constricted and crushed him like a snake. His rage and hate rekindled, but this time without focus—he hated just everyone and everything. He hated the wheels which jolted him, his body because it was bruised, the other bodies round him, the stars that danced above him, those unknown footsteps that tramped beside him on the road. Farewell to Jane and Caroline!" HoME大香蕉色人阁 ENTER NUMBET 0017
Refs
and further readingHOME
Resources
BLTC Research
Liberal Eugenics
Superhappiness?
Utopian Surgery?
Complete Genomics
The End of Suffering
Wirehead Hedonism
The Good Drug Guide
The Abolitionist Project
The Hedonistic Imperative
The Reproductive Revolution
MDMA: Utopian Pharmacology
Transhumanism: Brave New World?
Critique of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World
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