Doctor Who's world just a step away - From: The Advertiser -
December 01, 2011 HANDY devices like Doctor Who's sonic
screwdriver or Spock's tricorder are within reach, scientists
say. Organisers of the International Barcode of Life conference,
in Adelaide this week, plan to use miniature DNA decoding
devices to answer the question: "What species is that?"
Conference co-chair and director of the Australian Centre for
Evolutionary Biology and Biodiversity at the University of
Adelaide, Professor Andrew Lowe, says this is one of the most
exciting developments in genomics. "It's Star Trek and Spock
with his tricorder," he said. "You point this thing at an alien
species and it tells you all about it. That's where we want to
get to ... maybe in five years, which is really neat." By 2015
scientists expect to have a reference library of five million
standardised DNA sequences they can use to identify 500,000
species, which is more than a quarter of all known species on
Earth. They would take a sample and then compare