High-speed digital computers will eventually make analysis of chromosome pictures "as routine and widely practiced a procedure as fingerprinting and blood typing," a Yale biologist predicts.
In fact, Frank H. Ruddle, PhD, reports, a computer system for k
High-speed digital computers will eventually make analysis of chromosome pictures "as routine and widely practiced a procedure as fingerprinting and blood typing," a Yale biologist predicts.
In fact, Frank H. Ruddle, PhD, reports, a computer system for karyotype analysis now exists. With further development and testing, he said, it should bring automated chromosome analysis to the point "where it can be used routinely on the clinical as well as on the research level."
Dr. Ruddle said the automated system takes less than a minute to analyze a complete set of chromosomes and one to two hours to analyze 100—a job that would ordinarily take a trained observer 100 hours. He estimated that this could reduce the cost of clinical chromosome analysis to $5 or so, a price well within reason for routine screening.
He described the automated system at a recent American Cancer Society seminar in Phoenix. His associate in