• New CLARITY Challenge Open to Entries, to Tackle Undiagnosed Diseases

    Clinical Informatics News | Boston Children’s Hospital is launching CLARITY Undiagnosed, a $25,000 competition to identify molecular diagnoses for five families with as-yet undiagnosed conditions. The Challenge kicks off in conjunction with a documentary film tracing the journeys of the patients and—possibly—the teams. Teams have until June 11 to register

    May 21, 2015

  • Genome in a Bottle Uncapped

    Bio-IT World | As the Genome in a Bottle Consortium and the National Institute of Standards and Technology announce the first reference DNA samples as trusted standards for genomic sequencing, the FDA weighs a regulatory role for the new reference material.

    May 21, 2015

  • Schizophrenia Genomics Study Looks for Somatic Mosaicism in Brain Cells

    Bio-IT World | The Lieber Institute for Brain Development (LIBD) announced a 5-year, $10.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support a first-of-its-kind multi-site, interdisciplinary project to research potentially non-inherited genetic causes of schizophrenia. By identifying the root biological origins now, more precise and effective therapies can be developed later.

    May 20, 2015

  • Celgene to Use Cypher Genomics’ Data Analytics in Drug Development

    Xconomy | Under a collaboration announced today, San Diego-based Cypher Genomics said it would use its biomarker discovery service to help New Jersey's Celgene identify key genetic variants among patients who respond well to specific drugs.

    May 20, 2015

  • Robert Gentleman on His Goals for Drug Discovery at 23andMe

    Bio-IT World | Robert Gentleman’s goal is to “bring bioinformatics and computational drug discovery to complement the really strong genetics” already at 23andMe. He spoke with Bio-IT World about open science at a for-profit venture, the challenges of drug discovery, and what’s left to find via SNP chips.

    May 19, 2015

  • AWS upgrades highlight growing focus on cloud management

    Computerworld | Amazon Web Services is hoping better management tools will convince enterprises to move more applications to the cloud, but getting their internal management processes right is even more important than anything the vendor can offer.

    May 19, 2015

  • Bluebird Regulators Map Out Approval Plan For Gene Therapy

    Xconomy | One of gene therapy's major unanswered questions is just what it'll take to convince U.S. regulators to approve one of these treatments.

    May 19, 2015

  • Can We Identify Every Kind of Cell in the Body

    MIT Technology Review | With new tools to isolate individual cells and profile their genetic signatures, researchers are undertaking a microscopic quest to find out what we're really made of.

    May 18, 2015

  • Michael J. Fox Foundation Brings Parkinson's Data to tranSMART

    Bio-IT World | The Michael J. Fox Foundation, dedicated to driving basic research in Parkinson's disease, received a special Judges' Prize at this year's Bio-IT World Best Practices Awards for its work implementing the tranSMART platform for data sharing and analysis, including innovative programs like a patient registry and integration with studies of other neurodegenerative diseases.

    May 15, 2015

  • Oxford Nanopore Announces Auto Sample Prep, New Chips, Pay-As-You-Go Pricing

    Bio-IT World | Clive Brown’s Oxford Nanopore took over our Twitter feed on Thursday afternoon with news coming out of the London Calling event (#nanoporeconf). Many in attendance (and watching the Twitter feed) called the announcements “game-changing” and likened the atmosphere to Apple’s iPhone announcement in 2007. 

    May 14, 2015

  • Mayo Clinic Embarks on Population-Scale Pharmacogenomics Study

    Bio-IT World News Brief | Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., has announced plans to sequence genes from 10,000 patients for genetic variants that could affect their responses to a variety of medications, as part of a study that will track the long-term health outcomes of patients who undergo pharmacogenetic testing.

    May 14, 2015

  • Genentech Brain Trust Raises $217m For New Startup To Fight Alzheimers And Parkinsons

    Forbes | Three former top researchers at Genentech, the legendary biotech that is now part of Roche Holding, have raised $217 million in venture capital to start a new company, Denali Therapeutics, focused on treating and curing neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's, ALS, and Parkinson's.

    May 14, 2015

  • Allen Institute Debuts Neuron Periodic Table

    Xconomy | With the Allen Cell Types Database, the Allen Institute for Brain Science aims to catalog and classify the types of neurons that fill the brain.

    May 14, 2015

  • Citizen Science in the Unexplored Terrain of the Brain

    Bio-IT World | To understand how neural circuits give rise to complex mental phenomena, neuroscientists need detailed maps of brain cells in their natural environment. With an online game called EyeWire, one group of researchers is enlisting thousands of ordinary people to do what the best artificial intelligence cannot: turn huge numbers of electron microscope images of the retina into accurate, three-dimensional models of neurons as they appear in living tissue.

    May 13, 2015

  • Cleversafe Joins iRODS Consortium

    Bio-IT World | Cleversafe, a private cloud platform, announced today that it has joined the iRODS Consortium, a membership-based foundation organized to sustain the integrated Rule-Oriented Data System (iRODS) as free open source data management software. 

    May 12, 2015

  • Jennifer Doudna a Pioneer Who Helped Simplify Genome Editing

    New York Times | The biochemist at the University of California, Berkeley, helped make a monumental discovery: a relatively simple way to alter any organism's DNA. But she is stuck in a patent fight over it.

    May 11, 2015

  • Looking Forward to the Clinical Genome Conference

    Bio-IT World | CHI’s Clinical Genome Conference (TCGC) always offers a packed schedule of talks at the cutting edge of medical genomics. With a program once again pushing the envelope of where genomics and medicine will take us in the coming year, we aren’t expecting much down time over the three event days, though we always work in at least one trip out of San Francisco’s Japantown for Burmese tea leaf salad. Here’s what else we are looking forward to on the TCGC menu.

    May 7, 2015

  • PacBio, RainDance to Co-Develop De Novo Whole Genome Assembly Product

    Bio-IT World News Briefs | Pacific Biosciences and RainDance Technologies yesterday announced a co-development and co-marketing agreement to commercialize novel solutions for de novo whole genome assembly.

    May 6, 2015

  • Apple Pursues DNA Data

    MIT Technology Review | Apple is collaborating with U.S. researchers to launch apps that would offer some iPhone owners the chance to get their DNA tested, many of them for the first time, according to people familiar with the plans. The apps are based on ResearchKit.

    May 6, 2015

  • IBM Announces Watson Genomic Analytics; Collaborations with 14 Cancer Centers

    Bio-IT World | IBM Watson made a series of announcements today at World of Watson, a symposium IBM is hosting in New York. In opening remarks, IBM CEO Ginni Rometty highlighted Watson Genomic Analytics; introduced collaborations with 14 leading cancer centers to use the solution to scale precision oncology; and announced a partnership with Epic to integrate Watson into EHR systems.

    May 5, 2015