For one thing, said Eric Lander, director of the Whitehead Institute Center for Genome Research, the Genomics Era is not over. Everything should be included under the umbrella of genomics, he said, because we would not have proteomics if it weren't for the mapping of the human genome. But, if you have to learn about genomics from somebody, it might as well be from an insider. Reading the agenda for this week's conference is a little like reading the tea leaves for tomorrow's biotech news. And this year's conference is wide in breadth, to say the least.
Topics range from stem cell research to human cloning to obesity to engineering human organs.
But again, it all somehow hearkens back to genomics, Lander said. He spends his time researching small molecules and how they interact with proteins. Drug makers now know that if a drug fails, it's because it interacted with the wrong protein. And, he said, there is more than one protein that can cause a disease. The company uses cell-based assays to test the effectiveness of therapeutics.