decodeme
dgmacarthur | August 5, 2010Two days ago I reported a rumour that the FDA might have convinced genotyping chip provider Illumina to stop providing its products to direct-to-consumer genetic testing companies - a move that would effectively prevent these companies from being able to operate.
The rumour seemed plausible at the time, based on two pieces of evidence. Firstly, a letter sent to Illumina by the FDA in June warned the company that the use of its chips by personal genomics companies appeared to violate FDA regulations:
Although Illumina, Inc. has received FDA clearance or approval for several of its devices,…
dgmacarthur | June 7, 2010Personal genomics company 23andMe has revealed that a lab mix-up resulted in as many as 96 customers receiving the wrong data. If you have a 23andMe account you can see the formal announcement of the problem here, and I've pasted the full text at the end of this post.
It appears that a single 96-well plate of customer DNA was affected by the mix-up. This resulted in incorrect results being sent to customers, with alarming consequences in some cases; one mother posted on the 23andMe community about her distress upon discovering that her son's results were incompatible with the rest of the…
dgmacarthur | February 14, 2010This piece in Newsweek is a neat summary of the rise and fall of Icelandic genomics giant deCODE Genetics. Regular readers of Genetic Future will be aware that the company has been steadily bleeding capital ever since its launch over a decade ago, and recently declared formal bankruptcy. Since then the company has been bought up by US-based company Saga Investments. (For an excellent analysis of the implications of this sale, see Dan Vorhaus' post on Genomics Law Report.)
A reader emailed me to point out that buried towards the end of the Newsweek article is an ominous paragraph for…
sporte | January 7, 2010Blaine Bettinger has an absolutely wonderful post where he compares his results for type 2 diabetes from 23andMe and DeCODEme.
I really liked his post and I appreciated the way he showed the data from the two companies and elaborated on their interpretation of his genotype and his risk.
Interestingly, his story goes beyond a simple relationship, where one base changes, one amino acid changes, and voila! you've got the disease.
Bettinger describes what happens when there are changes in multiple genes and how those changes can have a cumulative effect on evaluating the risk of developing a…
dgmacarthur | December 22, 2009
I'm currently playing around with my 23andMe data in the deCODEme browser.
deCODEme's (apparently new?) Relationship Check feature, which appears to be a targeted version of 23andMe's Relative Finder algorithm, allows users to compare their genetic data to other profiles in the database and calculate the probability of a familial relationship.
My comparison with notoriously cranky deCODE CEO Kari Stefansson (pictured, left) gave me this reassuring result:
Phew!
On Twitter, genetic genealogist extraordinaire Blaine Bettinger noted that deCODEme appears to have also introduced a brand…
dgmacarthur | December 22, 2009Late last week I noted an intriguing offer by personal genomics company deCODEme: customers of rival genome scan provider 23andMe can now upload and analyse their 23andMe data through the deCODEme pipeline.
On the face of it that's a fairly surprising offer. As I noted in my previous post, interpretation is what generates the real value for personal genomics companies, so giving it away for free seems a bizarre approach to business - especially for a company living on the edge of a financial precipice. However, I also argued that the intention here is likely to be to generate an opportunity…
dgmacarthur | December 17, 2009A curious tweet this morning from personal genomics company deCODEme, barely a few weeks after the declaration of formal bankruptcy of parent company deCODE Genetics:
@decodegenetics: Migrate to deCODE this winter! Upload your genetic data for free. http://www.decodeme.com/data-upload
Here's a description of the service from the URL in the tweet:
deCODEme wants to give even more people the chance to enjoy the best in personal genomics. Our bioinformatics team has just launched a simple system to enable existing customers of 23andMe⢠to migrate their data into deCODEme and to join our…
dgmacarthur | November 16, 2009I was just sent this email by a deCODEme customer:
As a valued subscriber to deCODEme, we wanted to write to you directly to
let you know about some important developments in the company and how we
believe these will underpin our ability to continue to keep you in the
forefront of understanding what the latest advances in genetics mean to you.
For the past several months, deCODE has been working on restructuring its
operations. One of the principal goals of this effort has been to enable us to
find new investment that will continue our work in human genetics and to offer
to our customers…
dgmacarthur | November 16, 2009 Struggling Icelandic biotech deCODE Genetics has finally reached the point of formal insolvency. A press release today announces that the company has filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in a US court:
In a filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware late on Monday, deCODE listed total assets of $69.9 million and total debt of $313.9 million, as of June 30.
deCODE launched in 1996, basing its business plan on its unique access to biological samples and genealogical and medical records from the small, homogeneous Icelandic population. Since its launch it has proved wildly…
dgmacarthur | November 15, 2009Added in edit: for superb analysis of the announcement from multiple angles, you should also check out Dan Vorhaus' three incisive articles on Genomics Law Report.
Personal genomics company 23andMe announced yesterday on its blog (and in an email to customers) of impending changes to its product line. Until now 23andMe has offered only two products: its $399 full scan, and a $99 Research Revolution product that offers limited functionality and a focus on common disease risk prediction.
There are two major components of the altered product line. Firstly, customers will now be able to…
dgmacarthur | August 11, 2009A reader pointed me to this press release on the dire financial state of Icelandic biotech deCODE Genetics.
The slow financial train-wreck that is deCODE has been sliding off the rails for years (see stock price chart below), but things look set to reach their final resolution one way or another within the next few months: the company currently has $3.8 million in cash reserves, but is bleeding out $12 million per quarter, and "believes it has sufficient resources to fund operations only into the latter half of the third quarter".
Where to from here? In the press release, deCODE CEO Kari…
dgmacarthur | June 11, 2009The buzz leading up to this week's Consumer Genetics Show in Boston suggested that a major announcement would be made by the CEO of genomics technology provider Illumina, Jay Flatley. Illumina provides the most popular second-generation sequencing instrument currently on the market, the Genome Analyzer II, and has been making noises about moving into the personal genomics industry since at least the beginning of the year, so the announcement itself was not exactly a shock: Illumina is launching a personal genome sequencing service.
The launch comes with a new website, the appealingly titled…
dgmacarthur | April 1, 2009I noted yesterday that the annual earnings report of Icelandic biotech giant deCODE Genetics, one of the major players in modern human genetics, suggested that the company is veering steadily towards financial oblivion.Â
Today the company had a crucial earnings call - anyone interested in the details of deCODE's plight, or at least a sanitised corporate version thereof, should check out the webcast. The main messages from the call have been ably dissected by articles from Kevin Davies of Bio-IT World and Mark Henderson at The Times (in which I am delighted to be quoted alongside human…
dgmacarthur | April 1, 2009Personalised medicine pioneers Helix Health have announced their intention to seize control of the assets of personal genomics company 23andMe.
Helix Health founder Steve Murphy (left) laid out his takeover plans during a press conference this morning. "It's time to seize the moral high ground!!!!" he proclaimed, physically spelling out the additional exclamation marks to the assembled reporters. "23andMe have played their BS PR games for too long, and I'm here to put that right!"
During a four hour-long monologue that was often rambling and at times completely incoherent, pausing only for…
dgmacarthur | March 31, 2009deCODE Genetics, the major Icelandic biotech company behind personal genomics outfit deCODEme, has just released its financial results for 2008. Things really aren't looking good:
At December 31, 2008, the company had liquid funds available for operating activities, comprised of cash and cash equivalents together with current investments, of $3.7 million, compared to $64.2 million at December 31, 2007. In early 2009 the company sold its auction rate securities (ARS) for $11.0 million in cash which the company has been using to finance its operating activities. The company believes it has…
dgmacarthur | March 25, 2009New Scientist has a fascinating piece in which reporters Peter Aldhous and Michael Reilly demonstrate - with a little cash, and more than a little effort - the possibility of obtaining large-scale genetic data from someone without their knowledge or permission.
The reporters started with a glass that Aldhous had drunk water from; Reilly swabbed the glass and sent the sample to an unnamed commercial lab for whole-genome amplification (a technique widely used in forensics and research applications, which allows small amounts of DNA to be converted into larger amounts). An initial attempt to…
dgmacarthur | March 12, 2009Genetic genealogist Blaine Bettinger explores the results of his ancestry testing from 23andMe, and compares it to previous results from a much lower-resolution test.
The main message: the hundreds of thousands of genetic markers used by 23andMe (and other personal genomics companies, e.g. deCODEme) to infer genetic ancestry provide a much more detailed and accurate picture of the geographical origins of your genome.
No surprises here. The power of the type of genome-wide genotype data generated by 23andMe for ancestry prediction has been compellingly illustrated by a series of recent…
dgmacarthur | February 19, 2009Icelandic genomics company deCODE Genetics has received a license to market direct-to-consumer genetic tests (such as the genome scan provided by daughter company deCODEme) in the state of California. This follows the regulatory crackdown by California's public health department last June, which sent nervous ripples through the direct-to-consumer genetic testing industry.
Personal genomics rivals 23andMe and Navigenics both received their own licenses last August, and it's unclear to me why it's taken so long for deCODEme to follow suit (please feel free to speculate wildly in the comments…
dgmacarthur | February 9, 2009I'll be uploading a few of what I saw as the highlights from the AGBT meeting over the next week or so, as I go over my notes - you can also browse over Anthony Fejes' blog for live-blogging of many of the sessions. In no particular order, here are some of the tid-bits gleaned from Friday's sessions.
Kari Stefansson gave an overview of some of the latest results coming out from deCODE Genetics. He argued that combining multiple genetic variants for common diseases can now give clinically useful results - e.g. their work on thyroid cancer (published today in Nature Genetics) shows that the 3.7…
dgmacarthur | January 27, 2009Misha Angrist passes on a call from Case Western University for personal genomics customers to participate in a study of the experience of getting your genome scanned. If you've paid money to 23andMe, deCODEme or Navigenics, consider getting involved - Misha assures us that the process was relatively painless.
By the way, if you happen to be that most elusive of creatures - a happy customer of Navigenics - Drew Yates has been waiting to hear from you for a long time.
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