Another type of test coming out of the genomic revolution involves looking at individual genetic mutations that are known to be associated with specific medical consequences.
In the long term, researchers hope that a detailed understanding of the genome's permutations will lead to a new era of customized medicine tailored to individual genetic codes.
The hope was that the two populations would evolve in parallel, with individual genetic changes occurring in roughly the same order in both, and with similar final results.
This is particularly alarming because we are entering an era of personalized medicine where treatments and even medicines are being tailored to the individual genetic makeup of a patient.
By analysing which genetic variants an individual possesses and combining their expected effects it is possible to calculate if a person is more or less likely to get a particular disease than the rest of the population.
In the long term, researchers hope a detailed understanding of the genome's permutations will lead to a new era of customized medicine, in which drug regimens, diagnostic tools and medical devices are tailored to individual genetic codes.
Dr White has identified ten microsatellite markers that can be used to build up a unique genetic profile of the individual tree.
Let's start with two related questions: If early biological and genetic factors beyond the individual's control make some people more likely to become violent offenders than others, are these individuals fully blameworthy?
Insurers should also be prohibited from setting rates based on pre-existing conditions--just as they now are prohibited from taking individual's genetic traits into account.
And others are coming on the market that scan all 500, 000 genetic variants to give an individual a picture of their risk of several diseases at once.
And no drug company has yet perfected a standardized test to determine which particular genetic flaws lie behind an individual patient's cancer, a key prerequisite to targeted therapy.
Although prostate cancer, in which doctors face a choice between radically different treatment strategies, is an obvious choice for "tailored treatments", other researchers are hopeful that the genetic makeup either of the individual, or, more particularly, of the tumour, will be key to treatment choice in various cancers.
Within populations, the interactions between environmental and individual factors, including genetic makeup, explain variability in body size between individuals.
Scientists at Glasgow University say they have found a key genetic indicator of how long an individual will live.
This shuffling of the genetic pack is the source our individual uniqueness.
Millennium's work is a big step toward so-called personalized medicine, in which treatment would be tailored toward individual patients based on genetic makeup.
Before getting tested, she recommended talking with a genetic counselor to determine what an individual would like to learn and what would be done with the information.
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Any individual who had a genetic mutation that lightened his or her skin (and eyes) would absorb more sunlight, boosting health and the ability to survive and breed.
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As more is understood about the meaning of the code, new drugs and therapies will emerge, and eventually treatments will be tailored to each individual's precise genetic make-up.
He said it was clear that a variety of genetic and immunological factors affected an individual's response to HIV infection - and ways to measure these factors would become key.
That recommendation is part of a new approach for the AHA. The group says despite general dietary recommendations for most people, doctors still need to look at an individual's health history and genetic makeup before suggesting a diet plan.
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Scientists are on the verge of enabling us to attack diseases almost on an individual basis, thanks to molecular and genetic research breakthroughs.
In 2008, geneticist David Craig showed that he was able to trace pooled genetic data that was available online back to an individual who had participated.
If drugs tailored to individual genotypes ever catch on, sales of genetic-testing kits will soar.
"Family history remains one of the most important predictors of an event for an individual, " says Donna Arnett, a genetic epidemiologist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and president-elect of the American Heart Association.
Genetic tests enable scientists to pinpoint genes that can make an individual susceptible to a specific disease.
He dreams of a day, a decade or more away, when doctors will routinely and rapidly churn out the individual maps of thousands of patients, spotting the genetic errors that cause an array of dysfunctions or diseases.
Yet Venter dreams of a day, a decade or more away, when doctors will routinely and rapidly churn out the individual maps of thousands of patients, spotting the genetic typos that will cause an array of dysfunction and disease.
Precision diagnostics, which uses genetic and cellular targeting to decide which drugs are best suited for individual patients, is dragging disease care out of the realm of guesswork.
Unfortunately, because the individual risks associated are generally very small, and the genetic variations are very common, for most diseases this means we are unlikely to be able to predict the likelihood of developing disease in individual patients.
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