TIME EUROPE
January 15, 2000, Vol. 157 No. 2
Brave New Pharmacy
Using high-speed robots and the secrets of the human genome, scientists are changing forever the way they discover new medicines
By MICHAEL D. LEMONICK
Inside an old factory building in Cambridge, Mass., a remarkable machine with the improbable name Zeus is hard at work. Flexing its two robotic arms, the computer-driven device reaches again and again into a storage area the size of a toddler's crib, where thousands of individual samples of genetic material sit in tiny wells etched into plastic plates, each one identified by a unique bar code. One by one, Zeus searches for a particular code, dips into the corresponding well with a fine, quill-like probe and picks up a minuscule droplet of liquid DNA.
Then Zeus transfers each precious droplet to a nearby sheet of nylon, moistens a designated spot and pivots back to the glass plates to find the next sample on its list. When Zeus is done, the nylon sheet will be spotted with a grid of about 1,000 droplets, forming what researchers call a microarray. Once the machine has created a few dozen of these arrays, they will be rolled up, inserted into glass tubes and doused with radioactive dye and genetic material from a range of human tissue types — from normal, healthy cells to diseased cells representing breast, prostate, lung or colon cancer. Emerging from this experiment will be a set of data points, glowing with eerie phosphorescence, that may someday lead scientists to a new cure for one of the deadliest scourges known to man.
When the human genome was sequenced last year, scientists finally gained access to the full text of God's reference manual: the 3 billion biochemical "letters" that spell out our tens of thousands of genes. These genes, strung out along the 46 chromosomes in virtually every human cell, carry the instructions for making all the tissues, organs, hormones and enzymes in our body.
Once scientists have decoded these instructions — a process already well under way — they should have a better understanding of precisely what happens, down to the molecules within individual cells, when the body malfunctions. And, says Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health's Human Genome Research Institute, "if you understand the genetic basis of a disease, then you can predict what protein it produces and set about developing a drug to block it."
Here in Cambridge, a new industry is quietly taking shape that proposes to do that on a grand scale, as companies with names like Biogen, Genzyme, Genetics Institute and Millennium Pharmaceuticals — Zeus' home — prepare to change forever the way doctors fight disease. They're not alone: spurred by the prospect of scientific glory and enormous profit, big pharmaceutical firms and university and government labs have been joined by scores of new companies, not just in Cambridge but in Montgomery County, Md., Silicon Valley and other high-tech hot spots around the nation. It's a virtual gold rush to mine the mountain of potentially valuable data the genome contains.
The result could be a medical revolution. Until now, doctors haven't actually been fighting illnesses like cancer, stroke and heart disease. Instead they've been intervening at the level of symptoms — the last, visible step in a complex cascade of biochemical events. And they have done it largely by trial and error — finding new medicines in exotic plant extracts, for example, or looking for chemical compounds that resemble existing drugs. The process is so woefully inefficient that the drugs currently available target only 500 or so different proteins in the body, out of the 30,000 or so we're made of. Says Collins: "We've beaten those targets to death."
Even when they have the drugs in hand, doctors have to guess which ones might work for a given patient. To treat high blood pressure, for example, physicians must choose from six different classes of medications — and it's the rare patient who hasn't had to work his or her way through several of them before finding a medicine that works.
But in the new era of genomic medicine, this halting, inefficient approach should give way to something much more rational and systematic. Doctors will treat diseases like cancer and diabetes before the symptoms even begin, using medications that boost or counteract the effects of individual proteins with exquisite precision, attacking sick cells while leaving healthy cells alone, and they will know right from the start how to select the best medicine to suit each patient. MORE>>
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COVER STORY
Special Report: The Future of Medicine
With the mapping of the human genome the process by which new drugs are developed is being turned upside down. These drugs will also change our lives
Brave New Pharmacy
Using high-speed robots and the secrets of the human genome, scientists are changing forever the way they discover new medicine
The Hunt for Cures
Genetic information could lead to treatments for everything from AIDS to obesity
EUROPE
Prague Winter
When Jiri Hodac was named director of state television, Czech journalists saw a return to government meddling in the media
See Vous in Court
France is the latest nation to join the litigation game
Going up in Smoke
Switzerland, land of luxury watches and bank secrecy, has a new growth industry: marijuana
UNITED STATES
The True Blue Bush Cabinet
Its ethnic and gender balance is correct, but can a divided nation deal with the superconservative bent?
BUSINESS
Transparency has its Price
Executives at many German companies are finding it hard to adjust to the more rigorous financial disclosure required by global investors
On Spreading the Word
When it comes to selling merchandise, word-of-mouth marketing may be a company's best weapon
Essay: Meat Matters
Critics of industrialized farming may be forgetting about world hunger, writes TIME's Rod Usher
THE ARTS
Rebel with a Cause
The real-lifestory of an anti-Mafia activist in Sicily makes for a handsome film with a political message
The Upmarketeer's Tale
Bernard Arnault built his house by selling at deluxe prices and in his book he's still giving nothing away
The Art of Noise
For Europe's freely improvised music, the only rule is no rule
DEPARTMENTS
Techwatch
World Watch
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