{"id":1348,"date":"2014-11-17T09:50:31","date_gmt":"2014-11-16T20:50:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/2014\/11\/this_app_promises_to_read_your_dna\/"},"modified":"2014-11-17T09:50:31","modified_gmt":"2014-11-16T20:50:31","slug":"this-app-promises-to-read-your-dna","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/2014\/11\/this-app-promises-to-read-your-dna\/","title":{"rendered":"‘this app promises to read your DNA’ – colour me skeptical"},"content":{"rendered":"

I find much of the information that comes to me via various science feeds interesting, informative, & useful. But sometimes I see a headline & an article that give me a serious facepalm moment. And this headline on ScienceAlert<\/a> was one of them: <\/p>\n

\n

This app promises to read your DNA and give you personalised health advice.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Except that the app (under development) doesn't 'read' your DNA at all. It turns out, when one reads the actual article, that interested users must first send a DNA sample to a lab that will analyse your DNA, before feeding the information into an IBM computer program (called Watson), which will then provide that advice.<\/p>\n

We're told we can trust the app because<\/p>\n

\n

it also provides references from medical journals and clinical trials.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Surely we need rather more than that! I would need to have a great deal of confidence in the security of the system's processes – this is, after all, highly personal information that would be handed over to a third party.<\/p>\n

I'd also be wanting to know exactly what information the analytical lab was obtaining. Yes, DNA sequence; yes, differences in overall sequence, non-coding sequences, & probably sequence differences in many coding and regulatory regions. But what about the influence of epigenetics<\/a>, for example? <\/p>\n

Sorry, ScienceAlert, but I would have hoped for a more careful discussion of this particular topic – and the headline really lets your readers down.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I find much of the information that comes to me via various science feeds interesting, informative, & useful. But sometimes I see a headline & an article that give me a serious facepalm moment. 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