Longevity science

Medical researchers expect that with whole genome sequencing, treatment will be tailored to an individual tumor’s mutations, with drugs, eventually, that hit several key aberrant genes at once.

What is important, the researchers say, is the genes that drive a cancer, not the tissue or organ — liver or brain, bone marrow, blood or colon — where the cancer originates.

'Rare' disease can mean a lot of things. When you add it all up, almost 10% of the population will be diagnosed with a rare disease.

"In the United States, a disease is defined as “rare” if it affects fewer than 200,000 individuals, or roughly one in 1500. Rare diseases are often poorly understood, with symptoms that can be difficult to diagnose, and can be life-threatening. Around 6,800 rare diseases have been identified and the large majority of them — up to 80% — are thought to have a genetic origin."

Anyone interested in combing through 20 terabytes of data on more than half a million aging Brits will have their chance beginning today, when the UK...