The Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues
recently issued a request for public comment on a variety of
issues raised by large-scale human genome sequencing, and just
last week The New York Times ran an article on Washington
University’s effort to save the life of Dr. Lukas Wartman, who
was diagnosed with leukemia, by fully sequencing the genes of
his cancer cells and his healthy cells for comparison. After
finding that Dr. Wartman had a normal gene that worked in
overdrive, spurring growth of his cancer, researchers were able
to identify and use a new drug—which had been tested and
approved only for advanced kidney cancer—to shut down his
malfunctioning gene. Researchers say that Dr. Wartman’s case is
an illustration of the importance of genes in driving a cancer,
as opposed to the organ or tissues where the cancer originates.
Whole genome sequencing, along with greatly improved DNA
sequencing techniques, has the potential to improve our
understanding of the pathogenesis of disease and en