ENCODE and modENCODE Projects The ENCODE Project: ENCyclopedia Of DNA Elements Follow the ENCODE Project on: ENCODE Overview The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) launched a public research consortium named ENCODE, the Encyclopedia Of DNA Elements, in September 2003, to carry out a project to identify all functional elements in the human genome sequence. The pilot phase tested and compared existing methods to rigorously analyze a defined portion of the human genome sequence (See: ENCODE Pilot Project). and Genome Research [genome.org]. With the success of the initial phases of the ENCODE Project, NHGRI funded new awards in September 2007 to scale the ENCODE Project to a production phase on the entire genome along with additional pilot-scale studies. Read about the ENCODE Pilot Project. Top of page ENCODE Publications, Features and Press Releases Publications Features Press Releases ENCODE Consortium Membership ENCODE Data Release Policy Accessing ENCODE Data ENCODE Tutorials Go to ENCODE Tutorials!
Physicists Slow Speed of Light Physicists Slow Speed of Light By William J. Cromie Gazette Staff Light, which normally travels the 240,000 miles from the Moon to Earth in less than two seconds, has been slowed to the speed of a minivan in rush-hour traffic -- 38 miles an hour. An entirely new state of matter, first observed four years ago, has made this possible. Such an exotic medium can be engineered to slow a light beam 20 million-fold from 186,282 miles a second to a pokey 38 miles an hour. "In this odd state of matter, light takes on a more human dimension; you can almost touch it," says Lene Hau, a Harvard University physicist. Hau led a team of scientists who did this experiment at the Rowland Institute for Science, a private, nonprofit research facility in Cambridge, Mass., endowed by Edwin Land, the inventor of instant photography. In the future, slowing light could have a number of practical consequences, including the potential to send data, sound, and pictures in less space and with less power.
ENCODE Project at UCSC 12 Sept 2013 - New UDR ENCODE Download Method Available The UCSC Genome Browser is pleased to offer a new download protocol to use when downloading large sets of files from our download servers: UDR (UDT Enabled Rsync). UDR utilizes rsync as the transport mechanism, but sends the data over the UDT protocol, which enables huge amounts of data to be downloaded more efficiently over long distances. 25 July 2013 - BLUEPRINT Epigenome Data Hub and Quick Reference PDF Now Available We are pleased to announce the addition of the BLUEPRINT Epigenomics Data Hub on the UCSC Genome Browser through our Public Hubs function. Also the ENCODE Quick Reference Card is now available in PDF courtesy of OpenHelix on the ENCODE Education and Outreach page. 28 May 2013 - ENCODE portal changes: New Link to NHGRI Tutorials, New External Software Tools Page, Updates to Publications including New 2013 Consortium Papers Section The ENCODE portal was updated to include informative new and expanded pages.
LMM Research | PCPGM The Laboratory for Molecular Medicine (LMM) supports several research studies that are ongoing within the laboratory or in affiliation with other clinical research groups. For more information please click on the research study of interest. Noonan Syndrome/PTPN11 Gene Mutation Studies Investigators: Raju Kucherlapati, Ph.D., Amy Roberts, M.D.Contact: Amy Roberts, M.D. - aeroberts@partners.org or 617-525-5768Institutions: Brigham and Women's Hospital, Massachusetts General Hospital and Children's Hospital Boston This study examines genotype-phenotype correlations for individuals and families (children and adults) with Noonan syndrome and related disorders. Contact Amy Roberts, MD (aeroberts@partners.org, or 617-525-5768) for more information about study enrollment and inclusion criteria. For more information about Noonan syndrome, see Resources. Non-Affiliated Research
openSNP A Breath of Fresh Microbubbles John Kheir knows what it's like to lose a race against time with oxygen. In October 2006, the pediatric critical care doctor was treating a 9-month-old girl admitted to Boston Children's Hospital with viral pneumonia. As her disease worsened, her lungs hemorrhaged, filling with blood and blocking her breathing. Kheir jumped into action, shoving a breathing tube down her windpipe to help get air to her lungs, performing CPR, and eventually putting the baby on a machine that took over for her heart and lungs. But in the minutes it took to restore the flow of air into the young girl's body, her brain had already suffered permanent damage because of the lack of oxygen. She died a few days later. Devastated, Kheir began looking for better ways to get oxygen into the body. "This is a potential breakthrough," says cardiac intensive care doctor Peter Laussen of Boston Children's Hospital, who was not involved in the work.
personal genomics | Genomes Unzipped Dr Neeta Tailor is an anaesthetist working at the Royal Gwent Hospital in Wales. Dr Tailor recently treated a friend of Genomes Unzipped members (referred to here as Patient X) who required emergency surgery following some unusual and fairly horrible complications (believe me, I’ve seen the photos!) from wisdom tooth removal. The remarkable thing about this case: prior to surgery the patient volunteered information about her potential drug responses based on her 23andMe profile, including variation in one gene that could have had a profound effect on her response to a standard muscle relaxant. Dr Tailor kindly agreed to write up her experience in this guest post. For those interested in the genetic details: Patient X’s 23andMe results suggest she is heterozygous for the rs1799807 SNP, which induces an aspartate to glycine change in the BCHE gene and is associated with a substantially prolonged apnea (loss of breathing) following administration of succinylcholine.
A Shotgun for Blood Clots Think of it as Liquid-Plumr for the circulatory system. Researchers have designed a clump of tiny particles that rides the current of the bloodstream, seeks out life-threatening blood clots, and obliterates them. The approach works in mice and could soon move on to human trials. Blood clots are bad news for the brain, heart, and other organs. Looking for a better approach, biomedical engineer Donald Ingber of Harvard University and colleagues turned to nanoparticles. The researchers tested the approach on mice suffering from blood clots. "Making these particles so that they break apart at the right amount of force was a challenge," says Ingber. "The beauty of these nanoparticles is that they will not deliver this drug to any other place but the area of stress," says Heyu Ni, platelet biologist at St.