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Better
Computing Key
To Genetic Breakthroughs
SAN DIEGO
(Reuters) - Rival computer makers IBM and Sun Microsystems Inc.
have created an open computing platform to try to help genetic
researchers sift through the piles of paralyzingly complex genetic
data being amassed, a biotechnology industry conference in San
Diego, Calif., heard on Tuesday.
The announcement
came as the conference, called BIO 2001, was told that data overload
is the No. 1 problem facing genetic researchers in their quest
to discover drugs using the human genetic code.
Since the
mapping of the human genome, announced at this time last year,
researchers have been working feverishly to dissect the information
in a meaningful way. But in their haste to find cures for diseases,
they ``have done an appalling job of annotation,'' George Poste,
chief executive at biotechnology company Health Technology Networks,
told the conference.
``(Genome
research) will hit the wall in the next few years because we are
not making the necessary investments in computing. We must accommodate
the scale problem that is coming at us,'' Poste said.
Work done
by the Interoperable Informatics Infrastructure Consortium, or
I3C, comprised of 40 life sciences and technology organizations
including Sun, International Business Machines Corp. and the National
Cancer Institute, will allow researchers to access data from multiple
sources and in proprietary data formats on one common platform.
The platform
will use open computing languages, including Java and XML, as
a basis for exchanging and sharing data.
Jay Flatley,
chief executive of biotechnology firm Illumina Inc., said that
while technology has had a profound impact on speeding up biological
innovation, lack of standards for managing data endangers further
progress.
This will
become more of a problem as researchers dig beyond genomics into
proteomics, the study of how protein interactions result in disease.
``We are just
now looking at the tip of the iceberg in terms of understanding
biology. We need billions, if not trillions, of experiments to
understand biology'' so that genomics data can be translated into
so-called personalized medicine-- ``the right drug, for the right
person, at the right time,'' Flatley said.
FASTER PROFITS,
LESS FAILURES
``We have
to turn data into information. We will continue to invest in technology
because it makes things faster,'' said Dr. Michael Jackson, the
head of Johnson & Johnson's research institute.
Jackson said
the time it takes to move compounds into the animal or human testing
phase has been halved since 1996 because of technological advances,
with the number of new molecules discovered at J&J climbing from
three in 1996 to 17 in 2000. But available computing tools to
make sense of the vast array of data being churned out by researchers
are still rudimentary, leading Jackson to believe that the one
in 10 chance of a compound making it into the marketplace is bound
to improve when computing gets better.
Faster drug
development times and fewer failures are crucial to an industry
that spends, on average, $500 million to get a compound from discovery
to the pharmacy, researchers said.
Reference
Source 89
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