March 2010

Mark your calendars for the return of the IGSP's signature Genomes@4 series this spring. Held every other Wednesday at 4 o'clock, the seminar series is an opportunity for the Duke community as a whole to hear presentations and engage in discussions related to the Genome Revolution.

Geoff Ginsburg, director of the IGSP Center for Genomic Medicine, will kick off the series this Wednesday with a presentation entitled "The Human Genome, Personalized Medicine and Duke." He will discuss this important new paradigm in medical care and what Duke physicians and researchers are doing, in both the research and clinical settings, to make it a reality.

Ginsburg's talk will be followed two weeks later by one from Jim Evans of UNC-Chapel Hill on "Genomic Analysis in Clinical Medicine: Too much information or not enough?" On March 31st, Tom Schultz from the Duke University Marine Lab will discuss environmental genomics. IGSP Investigator Anil Potti will talk about "Markers and Modulators of Radiation Sensitivity" on April 7th, and Rick Kittles from the University of Chicago will close the series with a talk entitled "The Role of Diverse Populations in Personalized Genetic Medicine" on April 21st.

Please make a note that Ginsburg's talk on March 3rd will be held in Bio Sci 111. The remaining talks will be in their usual location in Bryan 103.

Exploring Links Between Genes, Violence, Environment
In a Chicago Tribune article about the evidence linking genes, violence and environment, Terrie Moffitt says in the case of the MAOA gene "you could see quite clearly the gene was doing nothing on its own. In the absence of a person's lifestyle and social relationships, the gene was not a powerful force. And I would hope that the public get that message that a lot of what genes do is under human control."

Genomics Gets Personal for Duke Professor
A Q & A in the News & Observer features Misha Angrist on personal genomics in advance of his book "Here is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics" (HarperCollins), which is due out this fall.

Use DNA to Stop Child Trafficking
In an op-ed published in the The Globe and Mail, Sara Katsanis writes that the arrest of a group of American missionaries on charges of child kidnapping in Haiti last month points to a key issue that needs to be addressed: Standardized DNA testing for international adoptions would help prevent such situations.

Enzyme Deficiency Protects Hep C Patients from Anemia
A team led by David Goldstein and John McHutchison has discovered two genetic alterations linked to a benign enzyme condition that protects some hepatitis C patients from treatment-related anemia. Read the original report in Nature.

Duke Opens Clinical Research Facility Focused on Molecular Medicine
A GenomeWeb article about a new $5.3 millioin facility designed to apply systems biology and molecular medicine approaches to early-phase studies of new drug or medical device candidates features work by Deepak Voora and Geoff Ginsburg designed to find out which patients benefit from aspirin therapy and which do not. The Wall Street Journal Health Blog also featured the effort in an article entitled Aspirin Blocking Blood Clots: For Some, It Doesn't Work.

Researchers Find Sex-Specific Lung Cancer Genes
Reuters covers findings by Anil Potti and colleagues that show the biology of lung cancer in women is dramatically different from what doctor's see in men. The work was also featured locally by WRAL. Read the original study in JAMA.

Destroying Newborn Blood Samples Threatens Birth Defect Research
"Most parents don't know that a newborn gets screened for diseases, let alone that a blood [sample] might get stored for any other purposes," says Susanne Haga in a Nature Medicine report.

The Controversial Connection Between Race, Genetics and Medicine
A Minnesota Public Radio report explores whether genetic markers could explain why some treatments work better for different racial groups. The broadcast features David Goldstein as the author of "Jacob's Legacy: A Genetic View of Jewish History."

Evidence-Ranked Motif Identification
Sayan Mukherjee, Uwe Ohler and colleagues describe a computationally efficient motif discovery tool based on analyzing genome-wide quantitative regulatory evidence in a Genome Biology Method report.

Replicated Association Between an IL28B Gene Variant and a Sustained Response to Pegylated Interferon and Ribavirin
In Gastroenterology, Jeanette McCarthy and John McHutchison confirm an association between an IL28B gene variant and response to therapy in patients with chronic hepatitis C infection and say that the genotype might be used in the clinic to determine the best course of treatment for patients considering antiviral therapy.

Common Genetic Variation and Performance on Standardized Cognitive Tests
David Goldstein, Elizabeth Cirulli and colleagues report in the European Journal of Human Genetics that no single common variant has a large effect (explaining >4-8% of the population variation) on the performance of healthy individuals on standardized cognitive tests.

DNase-seq: A High-Resolution Technique for Mapping Active Gene Regulatory Elements Across the Genome From Mammalian Cells
In a Cold Spring Harbor Protocol, Greg Crawford and Lingyun Song say "In a single experiment, DNase-seq can identify most active regulatory regions from potentially any cell type, from any species with a sequenced genome."

eMERGE Network Consent & Community Consultation Workgroup Informed Consent Task Force: Model Consent Language
Laura Beskow chaired a committee for The Electronic Medical Records and Genomics (eMERGE) Network that developed model consent language for the collection and storage of human biospecimens and data for future research. Their language document is available from the National Human Genome Research Institute.

For full details and the latest updates on IGSP seminars and events, see the Events Calendar

A selection of upcoming events:

Monday, March 1st
Computational Biology Seminar
Nicky Lekprasert presents "Thermodynamics properties of microRNA-mRNA duplex formation for microRNA target prediction."

Tuesday, March 2nd
Tuesday Seminar Series
Pelin Volkan presents "From Sensory Receptors to Functional Neuronal Networks: Assembling the Olfactory Circuitry in Drosophila."

Tuesday, March 2nd
Genome Academy
Darin London offers a Perl Tutorial in the Bostock Computer Library.

Wednesday, March 3rd
Systems Biology Seminar
John Tyson from Virginia Tech presents "Reaction Motifs and Functional Modules in Protein Regulatory Networks."

Wednesday, March 3rd
Genomes@4
Geoff Ginsburg kicks off the series with "The Human Genome, Personalized Medicine and Duke."

Monday, March 8th
Cancer Genomics Meeting
Jeffrey Chang presents.

Tuesday, March 9th
The IGSP Office of Education & Postdoc Services presents "Non-tenure-track Research Careers."

Wednesday, March 10th
Personal Genomics Working Group
Misha Angrist will lead the group in its second monthly meeting.

Thursday, March 11th
Genomic Medicine Forum
Sascha Tuchman presents "Gene Expression Profiling Refines Prognosis and Therapy for Multiple Myeloma."

The National Institutes of Health will fund the start of a Centralized Protein Sequence and Function Resource, which aims to be an easy-to-use and comprehensive resource of annotated proteomic and related information.

The National Institutes of Health will provide up to $25 million to fund as many as eight research centers to study traits or mechanisms across organ systems and diseases and use genetic and cellular approaches to lung, heart, blood and sleep disorders.

The NIH and FDA have announced an effort aimed at developing ways to translate new biomedical discoveries through regulation and into pharmacies and clinics.