The medical community has increasingly turned to genetic information to understand, treat and prevent disease in humans; but analyzing information from a single genome can take many months. Now, researchers working with one of the fastest supercomputers in the world are able to get data on 240 complete genomes in only 2 days.
The researchers, from the University of Chicago, have published results of their analysis in the journal Bioinformatics.
Aptly named Beagle - in reference to the ship that accompanied Charles Darwin on his well-known scientific journey in 1831 - the computer is based at Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois. Housed in the Theory and Computing Sciences building, Beagle supports computation, simulation and data analysis for the biomedical research community.
The team notes that the declining cost of producing DNA sequences is resulting in an increase in whole genome sequencing. But this currently brings about a "computational bottleneck" due to the limited power of analyzing several genomes at once.
Rather than looking at genomes one at a time, the supercomputer can process many genomes simultaneously.
"It converts whole genome sequencing, which has primarily been used as a research tool, into something that is immediately valuable for patient care," says first author Megan Puckelwartz.
Dr. Elizabeth McNally, the AJ Carlson Professor of Medicine and Human Genetics and director of the Cardiovascular Genetics clinic at the University of Chicago Medicine, says:
"This is a resource that can change patient management and, over time, add depth to our understanding of the genetic causes of risk and disease."
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