Given the manifold benefits of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) analysis, the goal now is to simplify and accelerate the process for a family doctor to economically conduct tests in a clinic. The current state of the art, i.e. collecting a mass of muck on a throat swab to find the DNA of an offending bug is like trying to find a button in the garbage. 

This may soon change. The University of British Columbia and Boreal Genomics are working to simplify the process and are now leading the way with DNA sequencing technology.

A spinoff from Prof. Andre Marziali’s laboratory at UBC, Boreal is developing tools to extract DNA from complicated samples. Developed from an invention by Marziali and UBC Physics professor Lorne Whitehead, Boreal’s technology can extract DNA from the dirtiest of samples, including dirt and tar.

Marziali’s team has developed the technology in multiple directions. While Boreal is already selling an instrument for researchers and forensics scientists to help clean up dirty DNA, his team of physicists and engineers are finding a way to separate bug DNA from human DNA. Coupled with a new DNA analysis technology they are developing, the team is hoping to build a device that could ultimately allow you to walk into a doctor’s office and get a quick diagnosis on whether you should be on antibiotics, or simply home in bed with a hot drink.

DNA provides molecular definition of who we are and from whence we came. It’s the molecule that holds the biological code that makes each species unique – like a genetic barcode for a living organism and relayed to successive generations during reproduction. 

In appearance, DNA is like a long reticular molecule that contains our genes in a compilation of simple units that line up in a particular order. The order of these units carries genetic information much like the letters of words DAN, AND, and DNA. The language used by DNA is called the genetic code and it enables organisms to read the information in the genes. 

In genetics, a feature of a living thing is called a trait. Sometimes they are visible in features such as in hair color or physique and sometimes are only evident in a person’s susceptibility to disease. The invisible traits that can only be seen in the blood are the ones that can increase the risk of a person developing conditions such as heart disease or cancer.

But life style is also a factor and if we’ve inherited a disease gene, it is known to be aggravated by smoking. 

Some traits are inherited directly through our genes. For example, tall thin people tend to have tall thin children – these traits are called genotypes. Other traits come from interactions between our genes and the environment. A child might inherit the tendency to be tall but if it doesn't eat properly it will be short. Such traits that are manifested by the combined action of inherited genes and environmental circumstances are called phenotypes.

More difficult to explain are the powerful acceptations or rejections of early influences. An athletic couple, for example, who devote themselves to the ski slopes may beget a child who, instead, takes up a sedentary life of doing tax returns – but what’s more, their genetic wiring may enable the parents to derive as much excitement from a perfectly executed 360 as their offspring from a perfectly balanced bottom line – yet the whole family may have red hair and green eyes. Although this may seem incongruous to an observer, we are moving ever closer to understanding it.

So if the scientists at UBC have their way, the day of a handheld device that can scan and analyze data – a Star Trek-like medical “Tricorder” – is not far off.