CONNECTOMICS
THE FUTURE OF PERSONALIZED MEDICINE
By
SHAYNA COHEN YIFAN MAO
“Human Connectome Project marks its first phase,” National Institutes of Health, June 8, 2016. https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/human-connectome-project-marks-its-first-phase
In 1990, the U.S. Federal Government embarked on a billion-dollar journey to do what was once thought impossible: sequence the human genome. With the ambitious goal of identifying genetic variants involved in diseases like cancer and diabetes, researchers quickly began their work on the project, sequencing
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small portions of anonymous donors’ genomes. Eventually, the project was completed in 2003, with a reference genome established based on those anonymous donors. This served as a springboard for future work in genomics. Through the Human Genome Project (HGP), scientists now have the ability to identify genetic
variants consistent with certain diseases for only $1,000 instead of billions. As research continues and questions of the origins of disease become more complex, an interesting question arises: what if, along with mapping the human genome, we are also able to map the connections in the human brain?
