• 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

  • Jonathan Rothberg Pursues Mobile Ultrasound

    MIT Technology Review | Jonathan Rothberg, founder of both 454 Life Sciences and Ion Torrent, is touting a new startup from his 4Combinator tech incubator that is developing a low-cost ultrasound device to plug into a smartphone.

    Nov 3, 2014

  • In a Restless Preclinical Testing Market, Organs-on-Chips Company MIMETAS Is in Expansion Mode

    Bio-IT World | Dutch startup MIMETAS, whose microfluidics technology forms a platform for three-dimensional, multi-cell-type tissue cultures, is securing new funding and partnerships as it expands its line of drug screening models.

    Oct 31, 2014

  • Expanding the Search for Knockout Mutations to the Human Population

    Nature News | With mass sequencing of humans now a practical reality, several large population studies are searching for people with rare mutations that completely knock out specific genes, to uncover these genes' functions and potentially new drug targets.

    Oct 29, 2014

  • Large Funding Round for Massachusetts Biotech Syros

    Xconomy | Syros Pharmaceuticals, a biotech focused on creating drugs that target gene expression regulatory pathways, has announced a $53 million Series B financing round.

    Oct 27, 2014

  • The Peculiar Internet Market for Genetic Health Reports

    MIT Technology Review | Since the FDA made clear last November that it would not tolerate companies selling genetic tests linked to health reports without regulatory approval, a workaround for customers of companies like 23andMe has emerged online.

    Oct 24, 2014

  • New Microscopy Technique Offers Astounding Resolution Over Time

    Bio-IT World News Brief | A paper published today in Science describes a new type of fluorescence microscope that is capable of taking images of living, three-dimensional systems over long periods of time without degrading cells or fluorescent molecules.

    Oct 23, 2014

  • Inside the HIVE, the FDA's Multi-Omics Compute Architecture

    Bio-IT World | At the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, a custom distributed computing system called HIVE takes a new approach to storing and analyzing huge sets of genomic and other biological data.

    Oct 22, 2014

  • New Data and Deployments from Edico Genome

    Bio-IT World News Brief | Edico Genome, a San Diego-based company manufacturing application-specific integrated circuits for processing genomic data, this week announced the broad commercial launch of its flagship DRAGEN processor.

    Oct 21, 2014

  • Instant Genome Browsing Over the Web with the NextCODE Exchange

    Bio-IT World | NextCODE Health has launched a new genomic data sharing environment, in which collaborators can browse and analyze one another's whole genome datasets at single-base resolution, as well as make individual variants publicly visible for research on rare genetic disease.

    Oct 20, 2014

  • BLAST in the Amazon Cloud

    Bio-IT World News Brief | The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) has declared that its installation of BLAST in the Amazon Web Services Marketplace is "the easiest way to start an NCBI BLAST instance."

    Oct 17, 2014