Hacker News Reader

Comment by progbits | Hacker News Reader

What would be the rough cost of equipment and consumables required to do DNA sequencing for say 10 people? Assuming similar genome coverage as 23andme gets.

Last time I researched it the estimate was 5-6 digits, but I'm sure technology advancements have made it cheaper. What happened to that $1000 nanopore?

I have some acquaintances with lab experience who could run this, and could split the costs between friends and family. Everyone gets their own data, no copies are made, all samples are destroyed. We can resell the equipment after to recover some of the costs.

This is the best way to be sure about the data not leaking or getting sold to boost CEO bonus.

View on HN

BGI (formerly Beijing Genomics) would be the one for you. https://www.bgi.com/us/sequencing-services/dna-sequencing/wh...

That seems like a service you send samples to.

I want to buy a machine, observe the whole process myself and then destroy/scrub the machine.

BGI does not sell the machines they reverse-engineered from Illumina. You can sometimes find old Illumina machines on ebay, or buy a new NovaSeq for a about a million.

If you really want to do this I would just do it like we do it in academic labs. Prep the DNA yourself and send to Illumina who will do the sequencing and send you the raw data.

The Nanopore Minion is still a thing, but it's sequencing and has higher error rates than competing short-read methods like Illumina's sequence by synthesis.

https://nanoporetech.com/products/sequence/minion

Sequencing DNA with nanopores: Troubles and biases https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8486125/

Based on what I'm seeing from 23andMe's website they only do genotyping, not sequencing.

https://customercare.23andme.com/hc/en-us/articles/227968028...

"23andMe uses genotyping, not sequencing, to analyze your DNA. Sequencing technology has not yet progressed to the point where it is feasible to sequence an entire person’s genome quickly and cheaply enough to keep costs down for consumers. It took the Human Genome Project, a consortium of multiple research labs, over 10 years to sequence the whole genomes of just a few individuals."

Edit: https://www.23andme.com/total-health

I guess they started providing whole exome sequencing, but I can't find information about what depth they're doing it at.

Sure I don't need a full sequence, just the bits used for health features on 23andme.

Of course the closer to a full sequence the better as any future research could be used by just reading existing data. But realistically just having data on few hundred most useful markers is enough.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com