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Close Enough, Close Enough

May 13, 2009

In response to Sandra Porter's request, Larry Moran says it's not a problem that the human genome isn't quite complete. His blog post includes a graphic that shows the regions of the human genome that are not sequenced and most of them are highly repetitive. "We know what's in the repetitive sequence regions even though we don't know exactly how it is arranged," Moran writes. "The effort required to finish of the last bit is probably not as important as getting a final draft of other sequences."

Breaking News
The Scan

Pig Organ Transplants Considered

The Wall Street Journal reports that the US Food and Drug Administration may soon allow clinical trials that involve transplanting pig organs into humans.

'Poo-Bank' Proposal

Harvard Medical School researchers suggest people should bank stool samples when they are young to transplant when they later develop age-related diseases.

Spurred to Develop Again

New Scientist reports that researchers may have uncovered why about 60 percent of in vitro fertilization embryos stop developing.

Science Papers Examine Breast Milk Cell Populations, Cerebral Cortex Cellular Diversity, Micronesia Population History

In Science this week: unique cell populations found within breast milk, 100 transcriptionally distinct cell populations uncovered in the cerebral cortex, and more.