Email this page

WASHINGTON, April 6 (AFP) -

Friday, April 7 12:33 AM SGT

A US-based private firm said Thursday it had taken a major step forward in the race to map the genetic makeup of the human body.

Celera Genomics, a company based in Rockville, Maryland, just outside Washington, said in a statement it had identified, or sequenced, all the chemical letters that make up the genes in one human being.

It is an essential step towards the goal of mapping the humane genome -- the scientific name for the 100,000 or so genes that make up the human body.

Decoding the human genome, or "book of life" is the holy grail of genetic research and experts say it will lead to major advances in medical research and health care, providing cures for Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's, AIDS, cardiovascular problems and some former of cancer.

In a statement, the firm said: "With the announcement today, Celera is on target to complete the assembly and annotation of the human genome later this year."

Assembly and annotation are the next arduous steps to perform – all the chemicals identified must be assembled in the correct order, then each individual gene must be identified.

The firm began its gigantic human genome-mapping task using a revolutionary technique that has speeded up the process and also proved its capability.

The method of sequencing the genome by fragments, then joining the fragments together, was successfully used to map the genome of the fruit fly recently.

"Now that we have completed the sequencing of one human being's genome we will turn our computational power to the task of ordering the human genome," said Craig Venter, the former government scientist who set up Celera, which began to sequence the human genome in September 1999.

Venter told a congressional panel studying genome research that he would finish the assembly stage within six weeks.

"We announced this morning that we have now completed the sequencing phase," he told the House of Representatives panel on Thursday.

"It is a very exciting milestone for Celera, an exciting milestone for all of us ... We are going on now to the assembling stage, to assemble the human genome and we think that will take three to six weeks."

A more difficult undertaking is the long process of identifying each individual gene and determining what role each of them performs in the human body and how genes interacts. Three genes, for example, are thought to be involved in the development of cancer in the human body.

The project also is seeking to determine what genes are responsible for such differences between individuals as eye color, and susceptibility to certain illness.

For that reason, Celera Genomics is already well on the way to sequencing the genomes of five other people, men and women of different ethnic backgrounds.

With its latest announcement, the first time scientists have claimed to have sequenced the human genome, the Rockville company places itself in the vanguard of the increasingly crowded field of genome research.

Rivals include The Human Genome Project, a government-funded consortium of 16 institutions in Britain, China, France, Germany, Japan and the United States, based in Bethesda, Maryland.

Celera has pledged to put the broad findings of its research at the disposal of the international scientific community once it has completed the assembly stage of genome chemical components.

The pledge is in line with a joint statement from British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President Bill Clinton last month that called on scientists to make all data on the human genome available.

The two leaders said scientists should make available to the public the raw data on the human genome, though researchers should still be able to acquire patents for inventions based on that raw data.

Venter said he hopes to use the data to find genes capable of developing molecules for new treatments and then patent them, a strategy followed by many biotech firms.

His firm has already signed an agreement with pharmaceutical giant Rhone-Poulenc Rohrer for the development of treatments for cancer and asthma.

On Wall Street, Celera gained a whopping 35 dollars to 150 dollars, a 30 percent rise, after the announcement.
======================

NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material
is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest
in receiving the included information for research and educational
purposes. Feel free to distribute widely but PLEASE acknowledge the
source.

Email this page

back to top