NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – Human Longevity today announced a collaboration with King's College London to access and sequence the college's TwinsUK Registry.
The San Diego-based sequencing and analytics firm will sequence whole genomes and microbiomes of up to 2,000 individuals, as well as conduct metabolomics analysis on up to 6,000 longitudinal samples in the database.
Containing more than 11,000 twin individuals, the TwinsUK Registry is "one of the largest and best characterized databases of individuals in the world," Human Longevity Co-founder and CEO Craig Venter said in a statement. Access to the phenotype information paired with the genomic and microbome samples "will enable the teams to collaborate on identifying correlations between phenotypes and genetic predisposition to health and disease," he said.
Human Longevity is building a database of human genotypes and phenotypes to help solve age-associated disease and human biological decline, as well as find commercialization opportunities in developing new diagnostics and therapeutics. The firm said it is currently sequencing and analyzing 2,000 genomes per month using Illumina's HiSeq X Ten instruments.
"The next-generation sequencing and analysis expertise of [Human Longevity], plus the unique data and design of the twin study, provides the perfect platform to unlock the clues to aging-related diseases and personalized medicine," Tim Spector, director of the TwinsUK Registy and professor of genetic epidemiology at King's College London, said.
Financial details were not disclosed.