Future pharmaceutical?

Dear Valli: you asked how it is that we commit an entire organisation to providing public education about genomes? Or, then, how much and for how long can we milk this cow you really mean to say? Technically forever, because there are millions of organisms to sequence, establishing the biochemical ordering of their DNA or RNA.

So far 180 organisms have been sequenced, including that of modern human beings, chimpanzees, dogs, cats, insects, worms, plants, protozoa, yeasts, bacteria and (ancient) archeabacteria. The harvest of information has been magnificent and enriches our understanding of life.

Some of the information can be used for health applications and has, as a result, great public benefit. Take for example the bacterium that goes by the long name of Saccharopolyspora erythraea. Sequenced by the companies Aventis Bulk and MWG Biotech, it produces an antibiotic that is used to treat pneumonia and bronchitis.

There is Streptomyces coelicolor, one of medicine’s most important microbes. Sequenced by Cambridge’s Sanger Institute, this bacterium and its relatives produce most of the natural antibiotics in use today, including tetracycline and erythromycin. This bacterial family also produces compounds that have anti-cancer properties.

I must mention Streptococcus agalactiae, a bacteria that can cause life-threatening infections in newborns as they pass through the birth canal. It also preys on adults who have chronic diseases. Sequenced by The Institute for Genomic Research, Group B Strep, as it is known, came from cows and jumped sometime to humans.

And finally, when it comes to health applications, you may have heard of Ashbya gossypii, a fungus that attacks cotton and some citrus fruits. Sequenced by Switzerland’s Bioznetrum der Universitat Basel, this organism also produces vitamin B-2 and some companies use it to manufacture vitamins.

You would be interested to know too of the many industrial applications there are for bacterial genomes. The commercialisation of genetic knowledge is making many individuals very wealthy. I have been struck by how many genome sequences of oceanic bacteria is used to make laundry detergents, for example

There is Oceanobacillus iheyensis, a bacterium that lives in extreme environments. Sequenced by the Japan Marine Science and Technology Center, scientists found it in mud and discovered that it has enzymes that could be potentially used as additives in laundry detergents.

Laboratories at the food company Nestle sequenced Lactobacillus johnsonii, a bacterium that lives in our intestines and may protect us from harmful microbes. Nestle put the organism in a yogurt-like dairy product called LC1, which apparently strengthens the human body’s natural defenses and keeps the bowel healthy.

Then are all those organisms that live in extremely high temperature environments, whose sequenced genomes provide the information to manufacture anti-freeze for cars driven in very cold climates. My favourite one though is Pseudomonas syringae, which is used to make artificial snow because of its unusual ice-producing capabilities.

You would be fascinated to know that many bacterial genomes are being used to clean up the environment. Phnerochaete chrysosporium or more commonly known as white rot is a fungus that lives on fallen trees. It plays a role in the global carbon cycle and could be used to clean up hazardous waste.

Black cottonwood was the first tree to be sequenced by the United States Department of Energy. They are used to make plywood and crates and are planted near water-treatment plants and dairy farms because of their ability to absorb wastewater.

And then there is nature’s most versatile bacterial microbe Pseudomonas putida, which could potentially be used to clean up pollutants in contaminated environments. Sequenced by a consortium of German laboratories and The Institute of Genomic Research, putida also protects some plants from certain pests.

And finally my friend, many genomes are sequenced out of sheer scientific curiosity, in the ongoing human enterprise to figure how things work. Our greatest companion the dog with whom we have co-evolved over the last 150,000 years had a sequence done in 2005: ‘we have sequenced 99 percent of the genome of a female boxer’ said Kerstin Lindblad-Toh, a geneticist at Harvard’s and MIT’s Broad Institute.

Heartwater disease which devastates cattle is the first genome to be sequenced in Africa. Completed late in 2004 it was a collaborated effort of the University of Pretoria's Onderstepoort Veterinary Institute and the Sanger Institute in Cambridge. Since then sequencing technology can be found at many South African universities and who knows what fruits of knowledge it will bring.