Sequence data to beset biotechs in 2010

Talk about data volume: Third-generation sequencing technologies will make it possible to catalog the DNA of every individual in large populations, says Eric Schadt, chief scientific officer of Pacific Biosciences and a consultant to Sage Bionetworks, the nonprofit driving an open source movement for genetics data.

The result: A huge software and computing challenge. The sequencing data will "rival all other areas of science with respect to quantity and complexity," he writes in Xconomy.

Informatics will thus present the greatest biotech challenge in 2010. The mastery of informatics, and the marriage of IT and life sciences, "will enable personalized medicine strategies that lead to better choices on how we not only treat disease, but prevent it altogether," writes Schadt. But first we're going to have to get a handle on exponential data increases.

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