Scientists Decode Female DNA

Scientists at Leiden University Medical Center claim sequencing of female genome.

The researchers at Leiden University Medical Center say they have sequenced the entire genome of one their female researchers, though no other scientists have yet verified their data.

The DNA sequencing was done with the help of state of art Illumina 1G equipment, which was installed in January 2007 in the Leiden Genome Technology Center, the genomics facility of LUMC.

The full complement of an organism's DNA is called its genome. In animals and people, it is made up of nearly 3 billion building blocks. The sequence of those blocks spells out the hereditary information, just as strings of letters spell out sentences. Decoding a genome, which is called sequencing, means identifying the order of the building blocks.

While scientists have made great advances recently in identifying genes for certain diseases such as cancer, those have not yet translated into cures or treatments.