Will Investments in Biobanks, Prospective Cohorts, and Markers Of
The Pharmacogenomics Journal (2005) 5, 75–80 & 2005 Nature Publishing Group All rights reserved 1470-269X/05 $30.00 www.nature.com/tpj EELS (Ethical, Economic, Legal & Social) ARTICLE different single-nucleotide poly- Will investments in biobanks, morphisms for some bases within that segment). As such, nearby alleles in prospective cohorts, and markers the same haplotype are inherited to- gether more often than is expected by of common patterns of variation chance, a phenomenon that is called ‘linkage disequilibrium’. Owing to that benefit other populations for drug coinheritance, haplotypes offer a way of summarizing the genetic variation response and disease susceptibility found within them. Researchers need identify only a few SNPs (called ‘tag SNPs’) to identify the longer haplo- gene discovery? type, which greatly decreases genotyp- ing costs for gene discovery.6 1 2 MW Foster and RR Sharp Those tag SNPs can be used to look for patterns or similarities in inter- 1Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA; individual genetic variation among 2Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy, Baylor College of Medicine, those affected by a disease or drug Houston, TX, USA response when compared with un- affected controls (ie an association study). The rationale for this strategy is that those similarities (most of The Pharmacogenomics Journal (2005) 5, BACKGROUND which will not contribute to the drug 75–80. doi:10.1038/sj.tpj.6500295 The International HapMap Project, at response or disease in question) will Published online 25 January 2005 US $120 million perhaps the most allow researchers to narrow the possi- high-profile example of infrastructure ble chromosomal regions in which a investment in the next generation of contributing gene may be located.7,8 genetic research, is intended to pro- High-throughput technologies, de- Tag SNPs can be tested for their vide a set of markers to facilitate cost- creasing costs for genotyping, association with a drug response or effective association studies.
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