Field Notes on Moving Focused Research Organizations Forward

Abstract

Over the last two decades, the cost of sequencing a million DNA base pairs fell from over $5,000 to less than a penny. That cost reduction enabled research across precision medicine, high-throughput small-molecule screening, species identification from air and water samples, atlases of gene activity and protein content for diverse cell types, virtual cell models, and many other applications, including many totally unanticipated by earlier DNA sequencing technologists. Consider what scientists wouldn't be doing as well or at all without that fundamental capacity. Low-cost sequencing came about via a fortuitous mixture of the government-funded Human Genome Project, academic discovery, and industry innovation. However, megaprojects like the Human Genome Project or the particle accelerators at CERN, as important and empowering as they have been, are rare one-offs. Many smaller-scale, critical gaps in capability remain, but the scientific enterprise is not set up to systematically identify, let alone bridge, these gaps.