The Next Sequence

摘要

Scientists needed $3 billion and 13 years to sequence the three billion base pairs encoded in a single human genome-the first time. By 2011, eight years after that first project was completed, the cost of sequencing a human genome had fallen to $5,000, in a process that took just a few weeks. And in January, Jonathan Rothberg, a chemical engineer and the founder of the biotech company Ion Torrent, unveiled an approach that is faster and cheaper still.