With the advent of NGS technologies it is now possible for any lab to re-sequence a human genome in a few weeks. Possible, yes, but still to expensive to do it routinely.
For this reason array capture technologies have emerged which selectively capture pre-selected regions of the genome e.g. all known coding regions.
Today the company Olink announced that they have developed a new technology with the same objective but not based on a microarray. Instead, the technology allows for masively multiplexed PCR reactions to selectively amplify pre-selected genomic regions. The technology is named Selector and was developed in colaboration with researchers from the University of Uppsala in Sweden.
Sorry about the long blogging break - we have been keeping busy here at CLC getting ready for the upcoming release of Genomics Workbench 2.0 . These days we are preparing the final test rounds and fine polishing the code.
Besides being busy coding, one of our NGS specialists has been busy preparing a presentation for the upcoming Illumina Genome Analysis workshop in Malaysia. Keep an eye out for him if you are attending!
We have just released a scientific white paper which confirms, that, in benchmarking tests, our new algorithm for assembly of Next Generation Sequencing data is indeed fast. Not only is our algorithm fast, but it also provides a better quality of the results, compared to other algorithms benchmarked in the white paper.
Assistant Professor at Rutgers University, Dr. Todd P. Michael, states,
The speed of CLC bio’s new algorithm for reference assembly of Next Generation Sequencing data raises the bar to a level currently unmatched by any competitor. When CLC bio continues this impressive rate of development, and eventually also handles SOLiD’s Color Space analysis in the same convincing manner, this could easily become a de facto tool for scientists working with Next Generation Sequencing analysis.
The white paper is free to download for everyone at www.clccell.com/ngs
You can read the entire press release by clicking here
In a new paper out in PNAS, Michael Lynch and colleagues report their findings from a comparative whole-genome pyrosequencing of yeast genomes. A total of four haploid genomes were sequenced in the study using the 454 platform. Surprisingly, the researchers found that the number of large scale genome events (insertions, deletions, duplications etc) was comparable to the number of point mutations that occurred.
Sequencing was done with highly variable coverage along the genomes and this have caused the authors to hypothesize that the yeast clones are actually not truly haploid but seem to be entering a partly diploid stage where some chromosomes are diploid and some haploid.
GenomeWeb has an interview with the first author where he elaborates on this
Today, a U.S. Department of Agriculture team, funded with more than $10 million from Mars Inc., announced that they will start sequencing the cocoa genome. The results are likely to help in the battle against cocoa plant diseases and, much more importantly, they could also lead to better-tasting chocolate.
A lot of people would probably also be thankful if the results could guide us towards a diet version with the same taste 
Update: IMB has posted a video promotion of this research project at YouTube.
