genomics

Researchers have developed a multidisciplinary approach involving immunology, genomics and bioinformatics to predict the immunity of a vaccine without exposing individuals to infection.

This approach addresses a long-standing challenge in the development of vaccines -- that of only being able to determine immunity or effectiveness long after vaccination and, often, only after being exposed to infection.

The revolution in genomics, with a wealth of data emerging from sequencing and simultaneous expression analysis of thousands of genes, has made it possible to study the numerous pathways and regulatory networks -- systems -- that operate to produce a desirable fruit.

Some people may know where their ancestors lived 10 or 20 generations ago, but the rest of us can learn our distant biological heritage only from our DNA.

New genomics analysis software developed by computer scientists at Stanford appears far more adept than prior methods at unraveling the ancestry of individuals.

Going back 20 generations the software can identify what continent or broad global region an individual's ancestors were from.