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The year of sequencing

Nature Methods volume 5, pages 11–14 (2008)Cite this article

In 2007, the next-generation sequencing technologies have come into their own with an impressive array of successful applications. Kelly Rae Chi reports.

In the toxicology building of North Carolina State University in Raleigh, Nigel Deighton, head of a small genome research facility, and a few others unpack the facility's first next-generation sequencing machine, a 454 GS FLX, on loan from Roche Diagnostics for three months. They train for a few days, nebulize a colleague's bacterial DNA and PCR-amplify “the living daylights out of it,” Deighton recalls. They load the bead-bound PCR products onto a plate with holes that are not visible to the naked eye, pop the plate into the machine and close the drawbridge-like door. Then they go out for a beer.

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  1. Kelly Rae Chi is a freelance science journalist based in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA kellyraechi@gmail.com.,

    Kelly Rae Chi

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Chi, K. The year of sequencing. Nat Methods 5, 11–14 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmeth1154

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