• How to Accelerate Rare Disease Research? Write a Dictionary

    Bio-IT World | The International Consortium for Human Phenotype Terminologies has announced an agreement between the major players in rare genetic disease research to use a fixed set of terms for human phenotypes, allowing computers to make rapid comparisons of patients and disease presentations across far-flung databases.

    Oct 30, 2013

  • 2014 Bio-IT World Best Practices Call for Entries is Open

    Bio-IT World | The 2014 Bio-IT World Best Practices competition has released its call for entries. The advanced deadline for entry is February 10, 2014; the early deadline is December 16, 2013.

    Oct 29, 2013

  • Budget Cuts and the Titans of Technology

    NPR | The Titan supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory is no longer the number one supercomputer in the world. On its own, a shift in the supercomputing rankings is not surprising. But Thom Mason, director of Oak Ridge, is afraid America may soon slip permanently behind.

    Oct 29, 2013

  • Research Highlights from the ASHG 2013 Annual Meeting

    Bio-IT World | The American Society of Human Genetics held its annual meeting in Boston last week, bringing together thousands of genetics professionals from around the world. Here's what you might have missed.

    Oct 28, 2013

  • Decoding Autism

    Genomes Unzipped | Last year a paper was published claiming a simple genetic test could predict autism risk from birth. Many felt that the paper illustrated the pitfalls of pursuing genetic risk prediction.

    Oct 28, 2013

  • Illumina Acquires NextBio

    Bio-IT World News Brief | Illumina today announced it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Santa Clara-based NextBio. NextBio's powerful big-data platforms aggregate and analyze large quantities of phenotypic and genomic data for research and clinical applications.

    Oct 28, 2013

  • NextCODE Health Launches deCODE's Clinical Genomics Platform

    Bio-IT World | deCODE genetics’ genomics platform has new life as NextCODE Health. The private company announced it launch yesterday with an exclusive license deCODE’s platform, a leadership team of deCODE alumni, and $15 million in venture financing.

    Oct 24, 2013

  • Open Research's Day in the Sun

    Xconomy | Open source and open systems are experiencing a "moment in the sun" in drug discovery says data commons advocate John Wilbanks.

    Oct 23, 2013

  • Academic Groups Filling the Discovery Gap for Pharma

    Forbes | With big pharma cutting R&D budgets, universities will need to step up. The Academic Drug Discovery Consortium (ADDC) hopes to facilitate just that.

    Oct 23, 2013

  • Network Verification Challenge Opens to All

    Bio-IT World | The latest challenge from the sbv IMPROVER project has launched. The Network Verification Challenge opened last week for submissions from the global scientific community.

    Oct 23, 2013

  • Bina Adds RNA-Seq Analysis Capabilities

    Bio-IT World | Bina Technologies has announced the general availability of its all-new RNA-Seq analysis capabilities. This new application delivers fast, accurate and scalable analysis of RNA-Seq datasets on top of the company’s Bina Genomic Analysis Platform.

    Oct 22, 2013

  • Faster, Scarless Assemblies

    Bio-IT World | There are plenty of plaudits for organizations in the life sciences that change the industry’s conceptions of what is possible, but one purpose of the Bio-IT World Best Practices Awards is to highlight those who refine those achievements until the merely possible becomes truly practical. That is why Bio-IT World was pleased to award an honorable mention at the 2013 Best Practices Awards to TeselaGen Biotechnology, a startup that spun out from the Berkeley Lab’s Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) in 2011, and Amgen for the development of TeselaGen: j5, an automated platform for designing DNA assembly protocols.

    Oct 22, 2013

  • Broad Institute Launches CLIA Lab and Exome Sequencing

    Bio-IT World | The Broad Institute today announced that it has passed Massachusetts state inspection, and can begin processing clinical samples as a CLIA-certified lab.

    Oct 21, 2013

  • Foundation Medicine Reports Validation of FoundationOne Assay

    Bio-IT World News Brief | Foundation Medicine has announced findings from a 24-month, multi-institution collaboration demonstrating the analytic validation of its FoundationOne cancer genomics assay. The results were published in the online edition of Nature Biotechnology.

    Oct 21, 2013

  • Quantified Patient

    Bio-IT World | Health care and the life sciences industry’s success ultimately turns on patient investment and compliance. No matter how brilliant the finding, how good the drug, how effective the treatment, it is only as good as the patient’s ability and willingness to participate.

    Oct 21, 2013

  • Alemtuzumab, My Dear Watson

    Forbes | Watson, the IBM supercomputer best known for its successful stint as a Jeopardy contestant, has a new gig as a clinical advisor at MD Anderson Cancer Center.

    Oct 18, 2013

  • 5 Ways Technology Is Changing Personalized Medicine

    Bio-IT World | Guest Commentary | In today’s doctor’s office, when a physician diagnoses a patient, a number of tests are consulted and the best possible course of treatment is prescribed. Unfortunately there is often limited data that allows the doctor to tailor and customize treatment specifically to a patient's biology and lifestyle. But there are five ways technology will change that over the next decade, bringing personalized medicine to fruition.

    Oct 18, 2013

  • Good Start's Test Detects More Carriers

    Bio-IT World News Brief | Good Start Genetics presented additional data on their GoodStart Select carrier screening test. GoodStart reports that 8.4% of carriers of genetic diseases detected with the Good Start tests would have been missed using other available technologies.

    Oct 17, 2013

  • Clinical Genomics, Informatics in Lisbon

    Bio-IT World | Bio-IT World is taking on Europe this December under a new name: Clinical Genomics & Informatics Europe. For our fifth year in Europe, we’re digging specifically into clinical genomics and the informatics that underlie progress. Our sequencing track will cover both clinical exome sequencing and RNA sequencing, and on the informatics side of the house, we’ll look at high-scale computing and genomic informatics. The program is rich with standout speakers. Here are just a few of the presentations we’ve flagged.

    Oct 17, 2013

  • Rare Recessive Disorder Hints at Crucial Role for 'Non-Essential' Protein

    Neuron | A team of researchers seeking to pinpoint the genetic cause of a rare disorder of brain growth have implicated deficiencies of the amino acid asparagine in the disease phenotype.

    Oct 16, 2013