What is a Microarray?
Professor Daniel Geschwind describes microarrays, small slides onto which DNA can be pasted, as an efficient way to study genes that cause disorders.
A microarray is essentially, an ordered array of DNA or any nucleic acids. It’s typically gridded out onto some kind of solid support, so that, basically in a very small area, let’s say a microscope slide, you can put down every single gene in the genome, forty, fifty-thousand genes in that small area. And you can basically then, in a very quick hybridization experiment, if you label, let’s say, different patients or different people's DNA, you can hybridize them on and basically measure, with fluorescent signal, how much of each DNA is binding to each part of the genome. So in basically one step, in a few hours or in twenty-four hours, you can assess the entire genome of an individual or a species for changes in copy number, for changes in expression, etc. So, essentially what it has done is given us the ability, rather than looking one gene at a time at specific things or a few genes at a time, to be able to look at the whole system of the genome in parallel. So it really has brought us into this area of genome systems biology. So we can look at the entire genome of an individual or a person or a treatment or anything, kind of at once, very, very efficiently and very cheaply now.
microarray, hybridization, technique, gene, genome, disorder, DNA, nucleic acid, biology, expression, daniel, geschwind,
- ID: 1178
- Source: DNALC.G2C
- Download: Theora Video Windows Media Video MPEG 4 Video
Related Content
15542. DNA microarray output
DNA microarrays provide the means to analyze patterns of gene expression at different timepoints in a living cell.
1177. Autism Endophenotypes
Professor Daniel Geschwind explains that studying endophenotypes is a useful way to understand the complexities of autism.
793. Whole Genome Association
Jonathan Sebat, a researcher at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, discusses how association studies are used to determine the causes of genetic disorders.
15992. DNA microarrays
DNA microarrays provide the means to analyze patterns of gene expression at different timepoints in a living cell.
15527. DNA microarray
DNA microarray
15036. Why we developed the microarray, Patrick Brown
Pat Brown talks about developing microarray technology for genome-wide analysis.
1204. Difficulties of Finding Genes for Autism
Professor Daniel Geschwind relates difficulties in studying a complex disorder like autism, where no two autistic individuals present with precisely the same symptoms.
553. Whole Genome Association
Special techniques are used for screening each individual’s genome for millions of different SNPs. This kind of comparison is referred to as a genome-wide association study.
15039. What's on a microarray, Patrick Brown
Pat Brown talks about how the 30,000 spots on the microarray represent genes.
1203. Finding a Gene for Autism
Professor Daniel Geschwind discusses the importance of his group's discovery of an autism locus on chromosome 17.