DNC: Health News - Geneticists Unveil Powerful Tool for Understanding Disease: "Geneticists Unveil Powerful Tool for Understanding Disease
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Written by Rita Jenkins| 27 October, 2005 19:18 GMT
a d v e r t i s e m e n t

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'Data from the HapMap project allows scientists to select the particular DNA variants that provide the greatest information in the most efficient manner, lowering the costs and increasing the power of genetic research to identify the origin of disease.' Genetic researchers have made substantial advances in understanding the root causes of common diseases and the history of human evolution, according to a series of reports published in scientific journals this week.

Chief among these accomplishments is the work of an international consortium of more than 200 scientists from Canada, China, Japan, Nigeria, the United Kingdom and the United States published in the October 27 issue of the journal Nature.

The team studied DNA samples from four different parts of the world and concluded that genetic variants located physically close to each other are inherited collectively as groups, called haplotypes. The comprehensive catalog of all of these blocks is known as the 'HapMap.'

'Built upon the foundation laid by the human genome sequence, the HapMap is a powerful new tool for exploring the root causes of"