dgmacarthur

The main theme of this year's Advances in Genome Biology and Technology meeting should come as no surprise to regular readers: sequencing. Generating as many bases of DNA sequence as quickly, cheaply and accurately as possible is the goal of the moment, and the number of companies jostling to…

Stephen Turner from Pacific Biosciences gave a dramatic presentation this afternoon launching PacBio's new third-generation sequencing instrument. The room was packed for the seminar, with a palpable buzz, and Turner's presentation was preceded by a theatrical introduction from PacBio CEO Hugh…

I've been remiss in blogging from the Advances in Genome Biology and Technology meeting here in Marco Island, Florida, primarily due to some panic-stricken last-minute changes to the slides for my own presentation last night. Fortunately the conference has been extremely well-covered by others:…

I'll be at the Advances in Genome Biology and Technology meeting in Marco Island, Florida for the next week, soaking up sun and genomics, keeping my eye out for the anticipated major announcements from sequencing companies and researchers, and quietly panicking about my presentation on Thursday.…

The Genomes Environments Traits conference in Boston is without a doubt the place to be on April 27th for anyone interested in personal genomics: the conference has managed to attract nearly every human being in the world who has had their complete genome sequenced (excluding, of course, anonymous…

My wife and I have embarked on our first collaborative genetic experiment:  Subscribe to Genetic Future.   Follow Daniel on Twitter

A reader pointed me to this article in the Australian news: it appears that a major Australian insurance company, NIB, is planning to offer half-price genome scans from personal genomics company Navigenics to 5,000 of its customers.  The catch is in the fine print: those who take up the offer "may…

This piece in Newsweek is a neat summary of the rise and fall of Icelandic genomics giant deCODE Genetics. Regular readers of Genetic Future will be aware that the company has been steadily bleeding capital ever since its launch over a decade ago, and recently declared formal bankruptcy. Since then…

Blogging on Genetic Future will be pretty much non-existent for the next three weeks.

Disclaimer: my wife and I have both received and used free testing kits from Counsyl. Counsyl is a rather enigmatic player in the personal genomics field: apart from a brief mention in Steven Pinker's excellent NY Times piece over a year ago and an even briefer post on a Newsweek blog late last…

Continuing my new tradition, here are some of the genomics-related links and information I posted on Twitter this week: RT @decodegenetics: The opportunity to migrate to deCODEme ends on February 1st 2010. http://bit.ly/86Xtsh Gah, it burns! RT @jcbarret: Science publishes behavioral genetic…

Keith Robison has a perceptive piece riffing off the recent Illumina instrument launch, and ponders whether 2010 will be the year that array-based genomic technologies finally start to die off with the rise of sequencing. The market certainly seems to think so. Check out the immediate effect on…

The big news from the JP Morgan investment conference today is the announcement of a brand new shiny sequencing machine from Illumina, the HiSeq 2000. The new machine boasts an impressive set of statistics, and looks likely to gradually replace Illumina's GAIIx as the workhorse of most modern…

Some of you may know that I post many links of interest that don't make it into a full blog post via Twitter. Since I know there are a number of blog readers who haven't yet made the move to Twitter, I'm going to follow in Dan Vorhaus' footsteps by posting a weekly roundup of useful links here on…

Several articles with a personal genomics theme popped up today. Most importantly, this piece in the Times by Mark Henderson is a superb analysis of the current state and likely future of the personal genomics industry, and a must-read for anyone interested in the field. Henderson notes that…

Genetic genealogist Blaine Bettinger has a fantastic post dissecting and contextualising a rather worrying result from his personal genomic analysis: a 50-60% increased lifetime risk of type 2 diabetes. Blaine is unfortunate enough to be among the 1-2% of individuals who carry two risky versions…

The Gene Sherpa predicts that Complete Genomics will win the Archon X Prize in Genomics in 2010. In the comments, Keith Robison is wisely skeptical. I agree with Keith - it's unlikely that the X Prize will be won this year, and if it is the winner is unlikely to be Complete Genomics. For those…

I'm currently playing around with my 23andMe data in the deCODEme browser.  deCODEme's (apparently new?) Relationship Check feature, which appears to be a targeted version of 23andMe's Relative Finder algorithm, allows users to compare their genetic data to other profiles in the database and…

Late last week I noted an intriguing offer by personal genomics company deCODEme: customers of rival genome scan provider 23andMe can now upload and analyse their 23andMe data through the deCODEme pipeline.  On the face of it that's a fairly surprising offer. As I noted in my previous post,…

A curious tweet this morning from personal genomics company deCODEme, barely a few weeks after the declaration of formal bankruptcy of parent company deCODE Genetics: @decodegenetics: Migrate to deCODE this winter! Upload your genetic data for free. http://www.decodeme.com/data-upload Here's a…

Misha Angrist has a very brief but eloquent rant in response to the genomics nay-sayers in this Nature News piece on the bankruptcy of deCODE Genetics. Here's a taste: I agree: GWAS is of limited value and this probably contributed to deCODE's demise. But whatever deCODE's fate, if whole human…

Pharyngula, via a reader, points me to the most aggressively bad attempt at a genetic testing product I have ever encountered, coupled with a truly horrific attitude to parenting. The tag line alone is hilariously inept: "Our Technology Spawned from Human Genome Project led by US Scientists. The…

European Genetics and Anthropology has a neat little tutorial that may be of interest for genetic hobbyists: it provides instructions on how to run the program STRUCTURE on your own genetic data generated by a personal genomics company such as 23andMe or deCODEme.  STRUCTURE is an extremely…

I was just sent this email by a deCODEme customer: As a valued subscriber to deCODEme, we wanted to write to you directly to let you know about some important developments in the company and how we believe these will underpin our ability to continue to keep you in the forefront of understanding…

Struggling Icelandic biotech deCODE Genetics has finally reached the point of formal insolvency. A press release today announces that the company has filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in a US court: In a filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware late on Monday, deCODE…

Added in edit: for superb analysis of the announcement from multiple angles, you should also check out Dan Vorhaus' three incisive articles on Genomics Law Report. Personal genomics company 23andMe announced yesterday on its blog (and in an email to customers) of impending changes to its product…

Medland et al. (2009). Common Variants in the Trichohyalin Gene Are Associated with Straight Hair in Europeans. The American Journal of Human Genetics DOI: 10.1016/j.ajhg.2009.10.009 A couple of weeks ago I reported on a presentation by 23andMe's Nick Eriksson at the American Society of Human…

Yesterday I posted a brief rant about the need for researchers to think about the best way to return genetic research data to participants, spinning off an equally brief opinion piece I wrote for the ongoing ELSI series at Genomics Law Report. Today Dan Vorhaus has posted an excellent piece on…

My contribution to Genomics Law Report's superb "What ELSI is New" series is up now. The gist of my argument: as we move into an era of large-scale whole-genome sequencing studies and the utility of genomic information grows, researchers will increasingly frequently be faced with the discovery of…

New-technology DNA sequencing provider Complete Genomics will provide near-complete genome sequences of 100 individuals to the Institute for Systems Biology, driving the first ever association study for a complex trait using whole-genome sequencing. Here's the press release, and GenomeWeb has some…