Genome

Genetic fossil record reveals the evolution of life 3 billion years ago

Life has been around for billions of years, but it’s only about 580 million years ago that organisms start leaving behind fossils. But our modern genes provide a window into the past, revealing how life developed billions of years ago. The genomes of modern organisms are all inherited from their ancestral counterparts, which basically means…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins Dec 19

Got $50,000? You Can Buy Yourself A Personal DNA Sequencing Machine

DNA sequencing technology isn’t exactly accessible; a typical sequencing machine can easily cost $500,000. A startup called Ion Torrent aims to change that with a desktop sequencing machine for just $50,000. The key to Ion Torrent’s Personal Genome Machine is a semiconductor chip that holds 1.5 million sensors, each of which can hold a single…

Tech News Ariel Schwartz - FastCompany Dec 8

Get Your DNA Analyzed for $99

Ever wonder if Dad’s grandiose claims of Khan blood hold water? Or if you have a genetic predisposition to Psoriasis? Get your DNA analyzed by 23andMe. Ordinarily, that’s a $500 proposition, but we can hook it up for 99 bucks. To get your special deal, click here and enter the code GIZMODO99. Then the company…

Tech News Joe Brown Nov 24

The first step toward building a mouse from synthetic DNA

Scientists have successfully created a small part of the DNA needed to build a mouse from scratch. It’s just a step on on the long road to synthetic life, but in the short term their breakthrough could prevent genetic disease. Previously the researchers, at the Venter Institute, synthesized an entire bacterial genome. That genome was…

io9 Annalee Newitz Oct 11

Japanese flower has the biggest genome in the world

A rare flower known as Paris japonica has a genome 50 times bigger than humans’. With 149 billion base pairs of DNA, it’s the biggest genome in the world, and stretched out end-to-end it would be taller than Big Ben. The flower has 19 billion more base pairs than the previous record holder, the marbled…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins Oct 8

How to build a new species by inverting its genome

The yellow monkeyflower is in the process of splitting into two separate species. But how does this happen? Now scientists understand better how to make one species into two. The yellow monkeyflower splits into two new species in two stages. First, it needs to find two different sets of conditions that it can adapt to.…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell Sep 29

Solid-State Systems Could Sequence a Genome For $100

Drawing individual strands of DNA through nanoscopic pores in a chip could do in a matter of minutes what the human genome project took more than a decade to achieve – sequence an entire human genome. Known as solid state nanopore sequencing, the technique identifies DNA base pairs by measuring their electrical properties as they…

Tech News Duncan Graham-Rowe - New Scientist Jul 7

Big Data, Big Problems: The Trouble With Storage Overload

We collect an astonishing amount of digital information. But as the Economist recently pointed out in a special reports, we’ve long since surpassed our ability to store and process it all. Big data is here, and it’s causing big problems. Walmart’s transaction databases are a whopping 2.5 petrabytes. There are more than 40 billion photos…

Social Media Brian Barrett Mar 17

California Company Offers Genome Sequencing on the Cheap

The research company Complete Genomics has figured out a way to sequence the human genome for less than $5,000 in chemicals, making it seem more likely than ever that affordable genetic profiles will become a thing of the mainstream. Complete Genomics, a biotech start-up based in Mountain View, California, announced last week that it had…

io9 Alex Eichler Nov 15

Scientists Mapping Out 10,000 Animal Genomes For “Genetic Zoo”

On the tail-end of news that all of the HIV genome and 98% of the pig genome has been decoded, scientists are announcing that they’ve got a plan to collect and sequence the DNA of 10,000 vertebrate species. Over 68 scientists worldwide are participating in the Genome 10K Project, the results of which would not…

Biology Rosa Golijan Nov 4

Genome Sequencing Gets 99.9833% Price Cut

Dr. Quake of Stanford University only needed $50,000 and a month’s time to complete a genome sequencing process which previously took $300 million, over 250 people, and several years. How cheap would Windows 7 be with this guy’s cost-cutting? Dr. Stephen Quake and his team used a “commercially available, refrigerator-sized instrument called the Helicos Biosciences…

Tech News Rosa Golijan Aug 10

No Neanderthal Ancestors for Modern Humans

If ancient homo sapiens got it on with their Neanderthal cousins, there were no children to show for it. Researchers studying Neanderthal DNA have sequenced half of the Neanderthal genome, and shoot down the theory that European humans interbred with the now-extinct species. And the team says the genome has other things to teach us…

io9 Lauren Davis Dec 9

Volunteers Let Their Genomes All Hang Out

The idea of making personal genetic information public evokes images of genomic Google searches and gene-testing job interviews straight out of Gattaca. But there are many who believe genetic openness could go a long way toward advancing disease research. Tomorrow, ten volunteers will take the first steps away from genetic privacy, allowing their personal genetic…

io9 Lauren Davis Oct 20

Instant DNA Scan is SMRT, I Mean S-M-A-R-T

Medcal treatments will take a quantum leap forward once we can develop drugs that are genetically tailored to a specific individual. But to do that, we need a way to sequence someone’s DNA quickly and cheaply. Today, it takes months and costs six figures. Pacific Biosciences’ Single-Molecule, Real-Time (SMRT) DNA sequencer is going to change…

io9 Ed Grabianowski Sep 15

Should Google be Able to Read Your Genome?

Gene-sequencing technology is taking off, but George Church at Harvard University is taking it to the next level: he wants to sequence the genomes of 100,000 people. Right now, about 12 human genomes have been sequenced and Church’s ambitious plan is likely to cost cost around $1 billion to complete. Recently Google — who in…

io9 Michael Reilly May 2

Human Genome Shirt Gives You Nice AAAS

To celebrate the mapping of the human genome, Science magazine published an issue featuring a T-shirt covered with the annotated gene sequence map of human chromosome 1. Now the AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) is releasing the shirt for all to have. And at just $22.50, nothing says “I understand women” better…

Gadgets Mark Wilson Feb 27

First Synthetic Genome Ready to “Boot Up”

At last, a gang of gene nerds have engineered a genome from scratch. The group, who work at Craig Venter’s institute, call the bacterium they built “synthetic life,” because they modded (rather than duplicating) the materials that grew into strands of DNA. Once they had enough strands, researchers linked them together and got a fully-fledged…

io9 Annalee Newitz Jan 24

Genetic fossil record reveals the evolution of life 3 billion years ago

Got $50,000? You Can Buy Yourself A Personal DNA Sequencing Machine

Get Your DNA Analyzed for $99

The first step toward building a mouse from synthetic DNA

Japanese flower has the biggest genome in the world

How to build a new species by inverting its genome

Solid-State Systems Could Sequence a Genome For $100

Big Data, Big Problems: The Trouble With Storage Overload

California Company Offers Genome Sequencing on the Cheap

Scientists Mapping Out 10,000 Animal Genomes For “Genetic Zoo”

Genome Sequencing Gets 99.9833% Price Cut

No Neanderthal Ancestors for Modern Humans

Volunteers Let Their Genomes All Hang Out

Instant DNA Scan is SMRT, I Mean S-M-A-R-T

Should Google be Able to Read Your Genome?

Human Genome Shirt Gives You Nice AAAS

First Synthetic Genome Ready to “Boot Up”

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