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SCIENCE UPDATE
Human genome sequence completed
Scientists have completed the finished sequence of the human genome, or genetic blueprint of life, which holds the keys to transforming medicine and understanding disease.
Less than three years after finishing the working draft of the three billion letters that make up human DNA and two years earlier than expected, an international consortium of scientists said last Monday the set of instructions on how humans develop and function is done.
“We put out the draft sequence as a way of getting it out to scientists as quickly as we could. It gives them something to work with and get going, but the aim was always to generate a reference sequence for the human genome,” Dr Jane Rogers, head of sequencing at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, said.
“It’s a bit like moving on from a first attempt demo music tape to a classic CD.”
The Human Genome Project has already aided scientists in discovering a mutation that causes a deadly type of skin cancer and accelerated the search for genes involved in diabetes, leukaemia and childhood eczema.
The completed sequence will help scientists to identify the 25,000-30,000 genes in humans, including those involved in complex diseases such as cancer and diabetes.
Researchers from 120 countries have downloaded information which has been freely available on the internet since the rough draft was announced in June 2000.
Middle-aged Concorde retired
British Airways has decided to retire its Concorde fleet by the end of the year, and Air France has reportedly pencilled in 2007 as the retirement date.
With return tickets currently starting at £3,655, travelling on board a Concorde was not cheap but, for those for whom money is no object, there’s just no other way to fly.
A child of the 1950s, Concorde is a product of nationalized industry, an echo of an Anglo-French-led technological future which never happened.
Human cloning ‘flawed’
Human cloning may never be possible because of a quirk of biology.
Scientists in the United States say hundreds of attempts to clone monkeys have ended in failure.
They think the biological make-up of the eggs of primates, including humans, makes cloning almost impossible.
Cloning has been successful in several mammals, including sheep, mice and cattle, but there is increasing evidence that it does not work in all species.
The research, reported in the journal Science, casts further doubt on efforts by a handful of mavericks to clone humans.
Clonaid, a company created by a cult known as the Raelians, claims to have already cloned several babies. It has produced no evidence to substantiate these claims.
Meanwhile, controversial reproductive scientist Panayiotis Zavos has published a picture of what he claims is “the first human cloned embryo for reproductive purposes”.
Misguided science: The majority of scientists agree that attempts to clone a human baby are dangerous and misguided.
Many cloned animals have been born ill or deformed and successful births are few and far between.
Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine used the method pioneered on Dolly the sheep to try to clone rhesus macaque monkeys.
They were unable to establish a single pregnancy after hundreds of attempts. Other groups have also tried and failed to clone monkeys.
The obstacle appears to be something to do with the way genetic material is parcelled up as a cell splits into two during embryonic development. Cells end up with too much, or too little DNA, and cannot survive.
It suggests that attempts to clone other primates, even humans, may be doomed to failure.
“This reinforces the fact that the charlatans who claim to have cloned humans have never understood enough cell or developmental biology (to succeed),” team leader Dr Gerald Schatten told the journal Science. — Dawn ScienceDotcom Report
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