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Genetic research benefits take time
By Fangfang Ren |
August 29, 2012, Wednesday
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Print Edition
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DEAR Editor,
In the August 14, 2012, issue of Shanghai Daily, you published a column titled "Genetics researchers publish too much of little practical use" on page A6, written by Dr Gholson Lyon, an assistant professor at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.
In the article, Lyon said genetic scientists pay too much attention on how many papers they publish rather than on scientific research itself. He voiced concern that human genomic research, which is supposed to discover efficient treatments for human diseases, rarely benefits people at present.
I found merits in his comments, but disagree on his claim that much of genetic research is of little practical use.
Research in modern biology has evolved from small-scale projects like DNA and protein levels towards large-scale programs such as genomics and proteomics levels.
Rapid progress
Ever since the onset of the Human Genome Project (HGP) in 1990, rapid progress has been made and in 2003 scientists achieved the goal of obtaining the human genomic sequence of 3.2 billion base pairs.
Scientists as well as the public expect genome research will improve our understanding of how the genome works and how genomic changes cause diseases. With complete and detailed information of a person's genetic makeup, researchers will be able to identify genes associated with diseases and design customized diagnosis and treatment strategies in a more efficient manner.
However, the reality is not always so simple. Lyon first emphasized genetic researchers publish papers. He said "Human geneticists specialize in finding disease genes. Once they succeed, they usually do not continue to develop their findings; instead, they move on to their next target."
I can't argue against this as a common phenomenon. However, the gap between scientific discovery and clinic application is remarkable in general. Although it has become less time-consuming and expensive to obtain large amounts of information from genomic sequencing, it is difficult to completely understand the information based on our current data analysis capacity.
Currently, genome sequencing is mostly limited to basic research, it is a long and burdensome way to transmit genomic information into clinical application. Both basic and applied clinical genomic research efforts are essential and neither can be underestimated. The efforts and funding applied in both sides should be nicely balanced, which is also a big challenge.
Privacy and confidentiality
Lyon also argued the results obtained from genomic sequencing are not delivered to the participants promptly. To solve this issue, more public servers are in great need to store the continuously expanding information and analyzed results, to which scientists as well as participants are to get access.
Then, another issue of privacy and confidentiality is brought up and needs to be addressed. Scientists and other related people must be extremely careful in the use of participants' genetic information.
Any discrimination based on people's genetic differences should be avoided.
Although almost 10 years have passed since the accomplishment of human genome sequencing, we still haven't perceived immediate societal benefits from this huge investment. This is a common challenge faced not just in genomic research but in most medical research areas.
Genomic sequencing did change the way people dissect disease mechanisms and expanded our understanding of many diseases, which can broaden our thoughts of drug discovery and design.
In spite of all the difficulties, we can still expect spectacular advances and a promising future due to the Human Genome Project.
Fangfang Ren is a senior scientist at the Department of Oncology in WuXi AppTec in Shanghai.
In the August 14, 2012, issue of Shanghai Daily, you published a column titled "Genetics researchers publish too much of little practical use" on page A6, written by Dr Gholson Lyon, an assistant professor at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.
In the article, Lyon said genetic scientists pay too much attention on how many papers they publish rather than on scientific research itself. He voiced concern that human genomic research, which is supposed to discover efficient treatments for human diseases, rarely benefits people at present.
I found merits in his comments, but disagree on his claim that much of genetic research is of little practical use.
Research in modern biology has evolved from small-scale projects like DNA and protein levels towards large-scale programs such as genomics and proteomics levels.
Rapid progress
Ever since the onset of the Human Genome Project (HGP) in 1990, rapid progress has been made and in 2003 scientists achieved the goal of obtaining the human genomic sequence of 3.2 billion base pairs.
Scientists as well as the public expect genome research will improve our understanding of how the genome works and how genomic changes cause diseases. With complete and detailed information of a person's genetic makeup, researchers will be able to identify genes associated with diseases and design customized diagnosis and treatment strategies in a more efficient manner.
However, the reality is not always so simple. Lyon first emphasized genetic researchers publish papers. He said "Human geneticists specialize in finding disease genes. Once they succeed, they usually do not continue to develop their findings; instead, they move on to their next target."
I can't argue against this as a common phenomenon. However, the gap between scientific discovery and clinic application is remarkable in general. Although it has become less time-consuming and expensive to obtain large amounts of information from genomic sequencing, it is difficult to completely understand the information based on our current data analysis capacity.
Currently, genome sequencing is mostly limited to basic research, it is a long and burdensome way to transmit genomic information into clinical application. Both basic and applied clinical genomic research efforts are essential and neither can be underestimated. The efforts and funding applied in both sides should be nicely balanced, which is also a big challenge.
Privacy and confidentiality
Lyon also argued the results obtained from genomic sequencing are not delivered to the participants promptly. To solve this issue, more public servers are in great need to store the continuously expanding information and analyzed results, to which scientists as well as participants are to get access.
Then, another issue of privacy and confidentiality is brought up and needs to be addressed. Scientists and other related people must be extremely careful in the use of participants' genetic information.
Any discrimination based on people's genetic differences should be avoided.
Although almost 10 years have passed since the accomplishment of human genome sequencing, we still haven't perceived immediate societal benefits from this huge investment. This is a common challenge faced not just in genomic research but in most medical research areas.
Genomic sequencing did change the way people dissect disease mechanisms and expanded our understanding of many diseases, which can broaden our thoughts of drug discovery and design.
In spite of all the difficulties, we can still expect spectacular advances and a promising future due to the Human Genome Project.
Fangfang Ren is a senior scientist at the Department of Oncology in WuXi AppTec in Shanghai.
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