Jonathan Rothberg discusses the first sequencing of an individual human genome {James D. Watson} - (MAY 2007 VIDEO)

Jonathan Rothberg discusses the first sequencing of an individual human genome (James D. Watson). The genome was presented in a public ceremoney at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Rothberg was inspired by his son's visit to the newborn intensive care unit to develop a new way to sequence genomes on a chip. This technology "454 Sequencing" was used to sequence the first individual human genome - as discussed here - for under $1,000,000 dollars. Because the sequencing is done "on a chip" Moore's law takes over and sequencing costs are now dropping at an exponential rate. It is only a matter of time before you have your genome sequenced.

Dr. Rothberg is the father of next-generation sequencing, and inventor of 454 sequencing, as well as bead emulsion pcr (cloning by limited dilution), and clone free methods of preparing DNA libraries now in use by all major next gen genome systems. 454 Sequencing, and 454 Life Sciences under the leadership of Dr. Rothberg completed not only the first sequence of an individual human being, but also initiated the Neandertal Genome project, and uncovered the bases for the disappearance of the Honey bee (CCD) using 454 sequencing. In addition methods developed by Dr. Rothberg to span large-segments of DNA - paired end sequencing-,were recently used by scientists at 454 to understand the complexity of rearrangements present in individual genomes. By mid 2007, 454 sequencing had enabled over 100 scientific publications.