SeqWright, a custom genomic and molecular biology service provider, has announced a research collaboration with Roche Applied Science and the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine.
The research focuses on a major study to help identify possible genetic variants associated with dilated cardiomyopathy, a disease of heart muscle.
In this collaboration, SeqWright used Nimblegen sequence capture human exome arrays to enrich over 180,000 exons from DNA samples, taken from individuals with dilated cardiomyopathy.
Using the Genome Sequencer FLX, a technology of 454 Life Sciences, SeqWright is sequencing the enriched exons to detect genetic variants within these samples, including single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), and insertions and deletions.
The complete system from Roche allows targeted resequencing of all of the coding exons, called the human exome, representing the portion of the human genome that is transcribed and translated into the myriad of proteins that function within all cells in the human body.
This work is part of an ongoing 15-year study of familial dilated cardiomyopathy brought to the Miller School of Medicine in 2007 by Ray Hershberger MD, professor of medicine and associate chief of the Cardiovascular Division.
Funding to Dr Hershberger for this project has been provided by the NIH's National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute and the Florida Heart Research Foundation.
