Everything is illuminated…or soon will be
Wow:
Today at the Consumer Genetics Show, Illumina CEO Jay Flatley announced the company will start offering whole-genome sequencing at 30x coverage for $48,000 (Personal Genomics Network, “PGNet”). Individuals contact the company via web/phone, meet with their doctors, ask questions, read and sign a consent form, and provide a sample. There will be a 7-day cooling off period. At the end of the process, the data are delivered to the doctor. There will also be a mechanism for people to put their genomes in the public domain if they want. “We think it’s time for this process to begin.”
There are four people going through it right now: Jay Flatley, Hermann Hauser, Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Henry Louis Gates, Sr.
Data analysis partners: 23andMe, Knome, decodeme, Navigenics.
UPDATED: Data will fit on an iPhone-type device and the customer will have continuous mobile access to it. For the time being, customers will receive their data on iMacs. (thanks Matt!)
Wow.
I work as an Assistant Professor in the Duke University Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy (although this site and its content are my own).
In 2007 I became the fourth subject in Harvard geneticist George Church's Personal Genome Project. As the PGP moves forward, I am chronicling the dawn of personal genomics, that is, people obtaining their genomic information for whatever reason(s) and figuring out what to do with it. I am interested in the relevant technologies and especially the attendant privacy and other ethical/legal/social issues.
This blog may also discuss some of my non-genome interests or, to paraphrase Dwight Yoakam, "Guitars, Cadillacs, hillbilly music, etc etc."
The header image comes from the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's multimedia performance piece, "Ferocious Beauty: Genome."