The Right Medicines for Different Genes

The Archon Genomics X PRIZE presented by Medco will measure teams on accuracy, cost, speed and completeness of genome sequencing. The goal is to push the industry to develop, more accurate, faster and more cost effective sequencing technologies.

“While many new technologies have been developed over the last decade and many human genomes have been sequenced, there is still no technology that can produce a highly accurate, reproducible human genome usable for diagnostics and medical treatment,” said Dr. Craig Venter, Ph.D. and co-chair of the competition in a press statement. “For genomics to truly impact health and diagnostic decisions for all of us, we need these technologies.  We believe this competition will be the impetus to truly usher in the era of personalized medicine.”

The $10 million prize purse will be given to the first team that accurately sequences the whole genome of 100 centenarians within 30 days for $1,000 or less per genome, at an error rate no greater than one per million base pairs.  The competition looks to usher in a new era of personalized medicine through sequencing the whole human genome to a level of fidelity never before measured. 

Upon completion of the competition, the X PRIZE Foundation says it will compile a public database of the DNA sequences and cell lines from the Medco 100 Over 100 genomes, giving researchers and scientists from around the world open access to the data.

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