The Code Breakers

摘要

Genes and genomes cascade around David Wheeler's ears in a virtual Niagara of data. Every day, the US National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) in Bethesda, Maryland, is sent more than a thousand new DNA sequences, the letter-by-letter codes that contain the master plan of life, to join the 18 million already there. The whole human genome is here, together with nearly a hundred other complete genomes ― mostly microbes―plus almost all of the mouse and rice genomes, and fragments from more than 100,000 other species. Most of the secrets of biology are buried in that endless stream of As, Ts, Gs and Cs, if only we knew how to find them. As head of NCBI's service desk, it's Wheeler's job to help biologists mine this vast lode. "It's like having access to the lab notebook of a god," he says. "You don't have to collect the data, only to analyse what's already been done. Many discoveries are lurking here, but no one has yet noticed them."