New Delhi, Dec 8 (IANS) India has successfully mapped the human genome that will help develop effective drug development in the country, an achievement that puts the country among an elite league of six countries that have achieved the feat so far.
This achievement will help develop predictive medicine and keep healthcare a low-cost affair for the common man. It can tell whether a person has chances of developing a certain disease and whether a certain medicine will have any impact on him or not.

“This is a unique achievement in the field of science. The US, UK, China, Canada and (South) Korea are the other countries who have achieved it before us,” Science and Technology Minister Prithviraj Chavan told reporters here.

“This genome sequencing sets the stage for India’s entry to an elite club,” he added.

The feat was achieved in less than two and half months time by a group of scientists at the Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB), a lab of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), the top science research body of the country. It was done at a cost of $30,000.

The international human genome project, comprising scientists from US, Britain, France, Germany, Japan and China, was successfully completed in 2003 after 13 years and an investment of $3.5 billion. The spectacular feat at that time was hailed equivalent to the man landing on the moon. India could not be a part of this large initiative due to resource constraints, Chavan said.

“But now we have bridged the gap of technology and joined the elite club. It will open up new areas of human biology. The life expectancy can also gain from this outcome,” said Samir Brahmchari, director general of CSIR.

He said that scientists sequenced the genome of a 52-year-old healthy male. “We got 2,000 new variations.”

He said the genome has 3.1 billion base pairs and the team at IGIB generated over 51 Gigabases of data using next generation sequencing technology.

“The sequencing of the first Human Genome in India in conjunction with Indian Genome variation programme opens newer vistas for low cost affordable healthcare and predictive medicine in future for the masses. This also opens up newer possibilities in disease diagnostics, treatment and sustaining low-cost drugs in the market,” he added.