National Human Genome Research Institute announces new priorities.
16 September 2002
KENDALL POWELL
Sequence should give cattle science a prod
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Cows, dogs and a single-celled predator called Oxytricha trifallax are next in line to have their genomes sequenced when the mouse, rat and human projects wrap up within the next year.
For a coveted position in the sequencing line-up, researchers submitted proposals to an advisory council of the National Human Genome Research Institute, touting the merits of their favorite organism. Bids ranged from helping to dig out genes from the messy human genome to improving the taste of meat.
The winners, announced this week, join the chicken, chimpanzee, honeybee, sea urchin, another single-cell invertebrate called Tetrahymena and 15 species of fungi on the esteemed list.
"Getting this high priority rating doesn't ensure that you will be picked up by a sequencing centre," explains Thomas Doak, who works on Oxytricha genetics at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. But front-runners have a better chance than those ranked moderate or low.
Future decisions will determine how prioritized organisms enter the NHGRI sequencing pipeline at three large centres at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, Missouri, and The Whitehead Institute/Massachusetts Institute of Technology Center for Genome Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The pig, cat and Rhesus monkey, which has been submitted before, are expected to go up for the next round of decisions in February.
Animal crackers
The possibility of getting the complete cow DNA sequence is "an unexpected joy", says cattle geneticist Jim Womack of Texas A&M University in College Station. We can fit in the cracks somewhere
Thomas Doak
University of Utah
Though not famed as a lab animal, the cow helped identify the first hormones, spurred reproductive technologies, and is the best model for tuberculosis infection, Womack points out.
The cow genome could also help "make beef less fat but still tender and tasty - a worthy goal from an agricultural view", says Womack. Sequencing cattle bred for meat, dairy or plough-pulling might also reveal a genetic basis for differences among humans.
As for man's best friend: it shares some of man's worst maladies. Researchers hope the dog genome will shed light on heart disease, cancer, deafness and even narcolepsy and obsessive-compulsive disorder.
And the freshwater protozoan Oxytricha trifallax is a lesson in genomic packing. Eschewing junk DNA, Oxytricha crams almost as many genes as a mouse - 30,000 - into a genome 60 times smaller. Doak thinks that the Oxytricha sequence should speed up the search for genes buried in human junk DNA.
It remains to be seen which of the highly ranked organisms will be sequenced first once the genome centres open up to new projects, but Doak believes that Oxytricha has a good chance. "We're small, we can fit in the cracks somewhere."
