Healthy body should be like

According to foreign media reports, Google launched a project that may have been its most ambitious and the most difficult scientific project ever: in-depth exploration of the human body. The project, called the Baseline Study, will anonymously collect gene and molecular information from 175 people (to be added to thousands in the future) to fully understand and define what a healthy human body should be.

The initial project was led by Andrew Conrad, a 50-year-old molecular biologist. Conrad joined Google's secret lab GoogleX in March 2013. He has now set up a team of 70 to 100 experts from a variety of fields including physiology, biochemistry, optics, imaging and molecular biology.

There are other large-scale medical and genetic studies as well. The Baseline project will collect more and more extensive new data designed to help researchers early detect signs of disease such as heart disease and cancer and to promote the advancement of medicine toward disease prevention rather than disease treatment.

"Biomarker"

The project's scope of research will not be limited to specific diseases, it will use a variety of new diagnostic tools to collect hundreds of different samples. Then, Google will use its powerful computing power to discover patterns hidden in the information data, or "biomarkers." The goal is to allow medical researchers to make use of those biomarkers to detect diseases much earlier.

For example, the study may reveal a biomarker that helps some people effectively break down high-fat foods so they do not develop hypercholesterolemia, heart disease and other diseases for a long time. Others may lack this feature, making it easy to get heart disease early. Conrad pointed out that once Baseline found the kind of biomarkers, researchers could check whether other people lacked it, helping them adjust their lifestyle or design new treatment options that would allow them to break down high-fat foods better.

With one of the world's largest networks of computers and data centers, Google is able to quickly push online search results and run services that require large amounts of data, such as video site YouTube. This computing power can now be used to store and mine medical information so researchers can more easily access it.

To date, most of the detected biomarkers have been linked to end-stage disease, since researchers are generally focused on patients, not on healthy people. According to Sam Gambhir, head of radiology at Stanford University School of Medicine, they have tried to use those biomarkers to preempt the disease, but the results are mixed. It has been more than a year since Gambier worked with Conrad on the Baseline project.

The two admitted that the project is a big step toward an unknown physical world. That is because the human body is so complex that little is known about the effects of human DNA, enzymes and proteins, and environmental factors such as diets. Perhaps the biomarkers discovered by the project will not help the researchers anymore.

Conrad predicts that the study will make "little by little" progress and that big progress will not happen overnight. "He knew it was not a software project that could be completed in a year or two," Gambil said.

Google said the information from Baseline will be anonymized and its use will be limited to medical and health purposes; those data will not be shared with insurers. However, think of the future of Google may know that thousands of people's body structure - deep into their intracellular molecules, or inevitably give rise to privacy and fairness concerns.

data collection

The Baseline project will be overseen by the Institutional Review Board, which oversees all medical research involving people. Once research begins, review boards run by Duke University and Stanford Medical School will begin to control the use of that information.

Baseline will work with a clinical trial company this summer to get 175 people involved in the trial. Baseline will collect body fluids including urine, blood, saliva and tears from participants. It will also create a tissue sample repository for participants.

Conrad's team will analyze the results of this trial and work with Duke and Stanford Medical School to design a larger, thousands-based study.

It is reported that the data for anonymous treatment, Google and other researchers can visit. Those data will cover all of the participants' genomes, the genetic history of their parents, their metabolic food, nutrients and medications, their heart rate under stress, and the changes they make to their genetic behavior.

Wearable device

In the meantime, Google X Life Sciences is developing more wearable devices with the goal of continually collecting other data such as heart rate, heart rate and oxygen levels. According to Robert Califf, associate dean of Duke University School of Medicine, Baseline participants will wear these devices.

Conrad said that Baseline participants will likely wear smart contact lenses that have been developed to allow researchers to continuously monitor their blood glucose levels.

Previously, research like this was costly and time-consuming. However, the costs of collecting genetic and molecular information have now dropped dramatically. The cost of sequencing people is now about $ 1,000, an alarming $ 1 million by the turn of the century. At the same time, the escalation of computing power means that the speed of searching patterns from the vast amounts of data collected has also risen dramatically.

Unlike most Google X projects, Baseline will not generate a particular commercial product offering. The study will also allow Google to further its access to the healthcare field it has just started.

Conrad predicts that the vast amount of new information that can be collected will help make progress in medicine. He pointed out that this is also in line with Google's initial mission of organizing the world's information and making it universally accessible and profitable.

http://online.wsj.com/articles/google-to-collect-data-to-define-healthy-human-1406246214?mod=rss_Technology

Translator: Le Bang

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