Illumina Method a Boon for Genetic Experiments

A small start-up biotechnology firm says it has a novel way for drug manufacturers and agricultural companies to do millions of genetic experiments at a time.

Using a method developed by Tufts University scientist David Walt, San Diego-based Illumina etches 40,000 tiny wells into the end of a bundle of optical fibers. That’s one well for every strand in the bundle.

Tiny beads with fluorescent probes are placed in the wells using a method that the firm’s acting president and chief executive, John Stuelpnagel, compares to scattering marbles onto a Chinese checkers board--each one nestles into its own well. The probes are designed to light up when they snag and recognize a piece of a gene. The optic fibers are connected to a sensor that reads the results from each well and sends the information to a computer for analysis.

In one application, the probes look for gene fragments linked to specific diseases, such as diabetes or high blood pressure--providing an early warning sign that might be useful to prevent future illness. Probes can also be used to test for properties in plants or for discovering human genes that determine which medications will work best for a patient.

The machine Illumina is developing should be able to read more than a thousand samples of human or plant DNA simultaneously--checking each one with 2,000 probes. Initially, the market for the devices will be companies “needing to do millions and millions of experiments,” Stuelpnagel said.