• Illumina and bioMérieux to Pinpoint Pathogens with Next Gen Sequencing

    Bio-IT World News Brief | BioMérieux, a French-headquartered biotech specializing in diagnostics and microbe detection, has announced a partnership with sequencing giant Illumina to create next generation sequencing tests for tracking pathogens during local outbreaks.

    Nov 19, 2014

  • Splash of Cold Water for Clinical Genomics at Cold Spring Harbor Personal Genomes Meeting

    Bio-IT World | At last week's Personal Genomes meeting at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, a debate over the evidence bar for using genetic tests threw into relief some of the stubborn questions around personal genomes' clinical utility.

    Nov 19, 2014

  • Coming by 2023 an exascale supercomputer in the U.S.

    Computerworld | The U.S. has set 2023 as the target date for producing the next great leap in supercomputing, if its plans aren't thwarted by two presidential and four Congressional elections between now and then.

    Nov 19, 2014

  • Shire to Move US HQ and 500 Jobs to Greater Boston

    Pharmalot | Shire is shifting U.S. headquarters, 500 jobs and some of its most important operations from suburban Philadelphia to the greater Boston area.

    Nov 19, 2014

  • How Much Does it Cost to Develop a Drug

    Pharmalot | Later today, the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development will release a report that will take yet another stab at determining the true cost of developing a medicine. In the meantime, Ed Silverman is running a poll.

    Nov 18, 2014

  • Top500 Supercomputer Listing With Minimal Changes

    Computerworld | The latest Top500 list is out, but only one new system made it into the top ten. The Chinese Tiahne-2 has kept its number on position for the fourth time, even though it has not changed its computing power.

    Nov 17, 2014

  • Vytorin, LDL-Targeting Drugs Work

    Bio-IT World Roundup | The results of the IMPROVE-IT trial were announced today, a seven-year study looking at whether Merck's Vytorin and Zetia pills actually prevent heart attack. The answer: yes. At least some.

    Nov 17, 2014

  • National Labs Buying Next-Gen IBM Supercomputer

    Nature | Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California announced today their plans to upgrade to a next-generation IBM supercomputer that will run at 150 petaflops.

    Nov 14, 2014

  • Google Increases Award in 'Nobel' Prize of Computing

    Mashable | Google has raised the stakes in the A.M. Turing Award, offering $1 million. The annual awards recognize "major contributions of lasting importance to computing," and until now have included a cash prize of $250,000.

    Nov 14, 2014

  • IBM Invests in Pathway Genomics' Watson-Powered Health App

    Bio-IT World | Pathway Genomics yesterday announced an investment from IBM to launch Pathway Panorama, a health-focused mobile app powered by IBM’s Watson’s natural language processing technology and fed by data from Pathway Genomics’ genetic tests.

    Nov 13, 2014

  • Inactivated Protein Lowers Risk of Coronary Heart Disease by 53%

    Bio-IT World | A sequencing study published tomorrow in the New England Journal of Medicine has further characterized the activity of the Niemann-Pick C1-like 1 protein (NPC1L1). Carriers of inactivating mutations of NPC1L1 were found to have a 53% lower risk of coronary heart disease and an average LDL cholesterol level 12 mg per deciliter lower than that of noncarriers.

    Nov 12, 2014

  • De Novo Human Genome Assembly Using Long Reads

    Bio-IT World News Brief | Evan Eichler of the University of Washington and colleagues have published a paper in Nature detailing a new whole human genome assembly, using the long-reading SMRT sequencing technology of Pacific Biosciences.

    Nov 10, 2014

  • Breakthrough Prizes Highlight CRISPR Gene Editing, Gene Regulation

    Bio-IT World | Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna, co-discoverers of the CRISPR-Cas9 mechanism that has swiftly become a groundbreaking tool in genetic engineering, are among this year's winners of the $3 million Breakthrough Prizes in the Life Sciences awarded by a coalition of tech billionaires.

    Nov 10, 2014

  • BaseHealth CEO Jorge Velarde Speaks About the New Market for Genomic Health

    Bio-IT World | As a new crop of patient-facing genomic health companies adjusts to cheaper DNA data and more intense FDA oversight, Jorge Velarde, a former Illumina executive and the new CEO of BaseHealth, tells Bio-IT World what we can expect from this second wave of interest in our genomes' influence on health.

    Nov 7, 2014

  • Genome Storage for $25

    Technology Review | Google Genomics says it is storing at least 3,500 genomes at the rate of $25 per genome per year. The analytics cost extra.

    Nov 6, 2014

  • What a Big Data Buy Could Mean

    ReadWrite | One acquisition in the Big Data space could change everything, one analyst predicts, pointing out that if Oracle or Cisco were to snap up one of the Big Data start-ups the collateral damage would be severe.

    Nov 6, 2014

  • Google to Cover Foundation Medicine Tests for All Employees

    BetaBoston | Foundation Medicine, the largest and most visible provider of broad genetic tests for personalized cancer therapy, announced this week that Google will pay for its tests for anyone covered under Google health plans.

    Nov 6, 2014

  • AstraZeneca Buys Definiens in Bid for Ground-Up Co-Diagnostics Pipeline

    Bio-IT World News Brief | AstraZeneca announced that it has acquired Definiens, a diagnostics company specializing in image analysis software, as part of a strategy to refine its immuno-oncology programs.

    Nov 5, 2014

  • October News and Product Briefs

    Bio-IT World | News and product releases from around the industry, including the GIANT Consortium's record-breaking GWAS, a new organ-on-a-chip company, and plenty of announcements from the annual meeting of the American Society for Human Genetics.

    Nov 4, 2014

  • NCI Awards Contracts for Cancer Genomics Cloud Pilots

    Bio-IT World News Brief | The National Cancer Institute has chosen two academic institutes and one private company to develop separate compute infrastructures for the analysis of cloud-hosted genomics data generated by large, public projects.

    Nov 3, 2014