VATIS UPDATE Article

A new initiative involving India, Britain and Singapore hopes to change that by creating a service that will help gather and share genetic information on individuals from across India. Global Gene Corp (GCC), India, was formed four years ago with the intention of studying Indian genomes, and coming up with clinical solutions. It has tied up with a British initiative that has created ‘beacons’ – essentially, an online service that allows researchers from across the world to find and share particular types of genomic data – to create an India beacon, ggcINDIA.

“The beacon will be hugely significant because it allows us to share with people, and it will allow them to share with us. Maybe, if a scientist has a question, we may have the answers coming out of our beacon,” said Dr. Jonathan Picker, at GGC. The expansive campus is home to many organisations working on cutting-edge research on genomics, including the Global Alliance for Genomics and Health, a collaboration of over 400 health care and research institutions that set up the beacon network.

Some of the beacons are based in other countries, including the India beacon, which will be based out of Singapore. The Indian beacon will be the first one to focus on an Asian population. While the collection of genomic data in India is taking place, it has largely been on a sporadic basis to date, with little opportunity to be shared, and fed into, globally.