Voyage To Sequence DNA From the World's Oceans

joehoya writes "Wired has an extensive article about an expedition with the goal of discovering new microbial species and new genes in the world's oceans. The expedition is led by J. Craig Venter, who is best known for his involvement in the race to sequence the Human Genome. This is a really fascinating expedition with a pretty high geek quotient. I know, as I set up many of the computer and other electronic systems aboard, and traveled with the expedition as far as the Pacific side of the Panama Canal. In fact, you can see me (ok, the side of my head) in one of the article's pictures, next to the Captain while helping to take a sea water sample."

Comments

privateer voyage

[Doc Ruby]

Venter's genome survey is surely a dream geek voyage. But when he patents those genes, it's only his own dreams that will be coming true. Sure, Venter's entire career is built on public funding of open genomic science, back into which he declines to contribute. But even worse, many of the species he documents, and locks up for his own use, were developed over hundreds, thousands of generations of local people, coevolving and husbanding them into their beneficial condition. But Venter has the upper hand over the traditional genetic "developers", end-running them to capitalize on their innovations, only to license them back at a profit actually earned by his customers. Venter's technology is good, his science is great, but his economics is most foul.

Re:Sequence and hope for the best?

[schrodingerskitten]

Exactly. I'm a biochemist, and I can't say that I'm too thrilled with the current attidute of "sequence first, ask questions later". Simply solving the sequence of a gene for a protein is NOT ENOUGH. It's just one peice of information, and does not tell you how the protein acts in vivo. Some of the most useful (and, I might add, more difficult to obtain) info to have are kinetic rate constants for the reaction performed by the protein. You can;t get that from a gene sequence. Sorry, I'm a little annoyed at the biologists right now.

Re:This has nothing to do with patents

[the gnat]

Furthermore, one of the problems with Celera was that the scientists involved were more interested in science than making money. I did some work for one of the former higher-ups who's now back in academia, and while he did very well from his association with the company, he's an academic scientist at heart. There's a good book out called "The Genome War" that goes into this in considerable detail; the corporate masters of Celera were apparently furious that Venter et al. were releasing so much data.

The impression I got was that Celera was really formed because of huge egos and a conviction that their methods were better (which, in retrospect, they probably were), not because the scientists involved honestly thought this would be a great way to make money.

As far as Venter's current enterprises go, the guy may be a dickhead, but I wish him the best of luck - he's doing fantastic science and he's consistently innovative. There is no shortage of arrogance among academic biologists, and Venter is by no means the worst case.

Re:Patents?

[Thing 1]

Without gene patents, unless you're Craig Venter or Paul Allen and just have money to play with for the sake of discovery, there is no motivation what-so-ever to create future theraputics and bio-devices.

I completely disagree. The delivery mechanisms and "bulk" structures can still be patented. But patenting genes themselves is a lot like patenting 1+1=2, or one-click shopping: there is a logical way to reduce it to its absolute minimum effort, so patenting that seems a bit absurd. (I should patent two-click shopping, or better yet, zero-click shopping: the site knows what you want and orders it for you without you lifting a finger.)