Re: Genome of DNA Pioneer Is Deciphered (Digg)

Genome of DNA Pioneer Is Deciphered (Digg): Referencing a NY Times article of the same title. The article is essentially about what the title alludes. One interesting piece of the article is:

As is probably true for everyone, their genomes are likely to contain mutations that could lead to disease, revealing possibly unfavorable information about themselves and their relatives. Even though the interpretation of the human genome sequence has only just begun, they are, in principle, exposing all their imperfections to public view for the sake of advancing research.

On to Digg comments (none of the data below has been verified...these are just 'interesting'):

From studentpat:

"What can you do with someone's genetic info?"

For example - codeine doesn't work for about 10% of Caucasians. You have pain after surgery or something, you get prescribed codeine, but your liver can't turn it into morphine. Genetic info would show that you don't respond to codeine, because you don't have the right copy of the certain liver enzyme. Your doctor prescribes another painkiller.

Multiply the above example times everyone that takes any drug that people respond to differentially (all drugs). So genetic info would only be useful for everyone to have. Which means it would be very useful for everybody.

SolipsistD:

The pace of development here is impressive.

The original Human Genome Project started in 1990, cost $3 billion and was going to take 15 years, before Venter and Celera scared them into doing it in 10. Now you can sequence a genome in 2 months with a $1 million machine. At a guess there is some difference in the completeness, but even so, 50 times faster and over a 1000 times cheaper - that's something.

Do we have a Moore's Law for DNA sequencing yet?

There were also a couple of mentions of Rosalind Franklin.