Wednesday, June 11, 2008

454 Life Sciences joins global genome map project

By Mass High Tech Staff

454 Life Sciences, a Branford, Conn., maker of DNA sequencing systems, reports it is among three firms to recently join an international effort to construct the most complete map of human genetic variation for biomedical research.

The companies new to the effort, dubbed the 1000 Genomes Project, include 454; Applied Biosystems, of Foster City, Calif.; and San Diego-based Illumina Inc. — all of which provide systems used to sequence DNA, according to 454.

Launched in January 2008, the 1000 Genomes Project aspires to produce a more vivid map of a human genome with an eye toward showing genetic variations important to biomedical research. Locally, the Broad Institute of Harvard University and MIT has become part of the project, which includes other biomedical research centers such as the Beijing Genomics Institute in Shenzhen, China; the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, in Cambridge, England; and the National Human Genome Research Institute, among several more groups.

454 Life Sciences is a unit of Swiss medical products giant Roche Holding AG. Roche acquired 454 from Connecticut biotech firm CuraGen Corp. last year in a deal worth up to $155 million.