Lifeboat Foundation

You could say that Illumina is to DNA sequencing is what Google is to Internet search, but that would be underselling the San Diego-based biotech company. Illumina’s machines, the best and cheapest on the market, generate 90 percent of all DNA sequence data today. Illumina is, as they say, crushing it.

But as lucrative as that 90 percent slice is for Illumina now, the whole pie is likely to get even bigger in the future. Less than 0.01 percent of the world’s population has been sequenced so far. So recently, Illumina has made bold moves positioning itself for the future: The company is consolidating its core hardware business—this week, it sued an upstart competitor, Oxford Nanopore Technologies, for patent infringement—while moving into the genetic testing business with new ventures like the liquid cancer biopsy spinoff, Grail.

The company is a looking toward a future in which a lot more people gets genetic tests—and a lot more often. “Grail’s business will be very different than Illumina’s core business,” Eric Endicott, Illumina’s director of global public relations, said in an email. “We are at a tipping point in genomics, where a broad community of scientists and researchers continue to translate the potential of the genome from science to discoveries and applications.”

Continue reading “Illumina, the Google of Genetic Testing, Has Plans for World Domination” »

Now we can turn sugar into Nylon.

Genetically engineered yeast plus electro-catalyst yields bio-based nylon.

Breaking the bacteria barriers.

If that field is at just the right magnitude, it will open up pores within the cell membrane, through which DNA can flow. But it can take scientists months or even years to figure out the exact electric field conditions to reversibly unlock a membrane’s pores.

A new microfluidic device developed by MIT engineers may help scientists quickly home in on the electric field “sweet spot” — the range of electric potentials that will harmlessly and temporarily open up membrane pores to let DNA in. In principle, the simple device could be used on any microorganism or cell, significantly speeding up the first step in genetic engineering.

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Scientists have redefined the classification of animals due to genetics; 1st time in 300 years. I wonder how the Vets and the Vet Colleges will respond?

The classification system for animals has been hotly debated and frequently changed since it was created 300 years ago, but now researchers have actually found a genetic basis which confirms that part of the system we use today is actually pretty accurate—and they think this part can be defined even more specifically down to the genetic level.

An international team led by Professor Itai YanaAi of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology Department of Biology made the discovery after using an extraordinarily powerful technique known as CEL-Seq. CEL-Seq monitors individual cells for their gene activity (as detected via mRNA)—and they applied it across 10 different species, with CEL-Seq being applied to 70 embryos per species.

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“Finding that GDF11 levels are under genetic control is of significant interest. Since it is under genetic control, we can find the genes responsible for GDF11 levels and its changes with age,” said the study’s senior author Rob Pazdro, assistant professor at University of Georgia in the US.

Scientists have shown that a hormone instrumental in the ageing process is under genetic control, introducing a new mechanism by which genetics regulate ageing and disease.

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Even though it’s looking increasingly likely that humanity will find a way to wipe itself off the face of the Earth, there’s a chance that our creative output may live on. Servers, hard drives, flash drives, and disks will degrade (as will our libraries of paper books, of course), but a group of researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology have found a way to encode data onto DNA—the very same stuff that all living beings’ genetic information is stored on—that could survive for millennia.

One gram of DNA can potentially hold up to 455 exabytes of data, according to the New Scientist. For reference: There are one billion gigabytes in an exabyte, and 1,000 exabytes in a zettabyte. The cloud computing company EMC estimated that there were 1.8 zettabytes of data in the world in 2011, which means we would need only about 4 grams (about a teaspoon) of DNA to hold everything from Plato through the complete works of Shakespeare to Beyonce’s latest album (not to mention every brunch photo ever posted on Instagram).

There are four types of molecules that make up DNA, which form pairs. To encode information on DNA, scientists program the pairs into 1s and os—the same binary language that encodes digital data. This is not a new concept—scientists at Harvard University encoded a book onto DNA in 2012—but up to now, it had been difficult to retrieve the information stored on the DNA.

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Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is often difficult to treat due to an enzyme (endonuclease DFF40/CAD (Death Fragmentation Factor, 40 kDa subunit / Caspase-Activated DNase)). This enzyme, which is essential for degrading DNA during apoptosis, appears both downregulated and improperly located inside the tumour cells. The researchers observed that overexpression of the enzyme allows the glioblastoma cells to properly degrade their DNA content.

Glioblastoma is the most aggressive manifestation of brain tumours. Due to its high invasive capacity and uncontrolled, infiltrating growth, it is particularly difficult to manage. Currently, the treatment for this disease consists of a combination of surgery (when possible), radiation and chemotherapy. Although current therapy raises the overall survival of patients by around 15 months, it remains inefficient at eradicating tumour cells and, unfortunately, recurrences are another of this cancer’s characteristics.

A team of researchers from the Institute of Neuroscience at the UAB, together with the Hospital Universitari de Bellvitge — ICO, have identified a common molecular alteration in glioblastoma. The researchers observed that the cells of this type of tumour harbour a common intrinsic defect that prevents them from degrading their genetic material during apoptosis, the most important form of programmed cell death induced by radiotherapy and chemotherapy.

Continue reading “Biochemical alteration responsible for brain tumor resistance identified” »

The facts about the CRISPR Patent.

Xconomy San Francisco —

If you ask people who don’t follow biotech too closely what they know about CRISPR, you might get two answers: genetic editing and a big patent fight.

Continue reading “Caribou Bio’s New CRISPR Patent Isn’t About Gene Editing” »

Autism has diverse genetic causes, most of which are still unknown. About 1 percent of people with autism are missing a gene called Shank3, which is critical for brain development. Without this gene, individuals develop typical autism symptoms including repetitive behavior and avoidance of social interactions.

In a study of mice, MIT researchers have now shown that they can reverse some of those behavioral symptoms by turning the gene back on later in life, allowing the brain to properly rewire itself.

“This suggests that even in the adult brain we have profound plasticity to some degree,” says Guoping Feng, an MIT professor of brain and cognitive sciences. “There is more and more evidence showing that some of the defects are indeed reversible, giving hope that we can develop treatment for autistic patients in the future.”

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