UK aims to become world number one in DNA testing with new investment

David Cameron, the UK Prime Minister, has announced a package of investment worth more than £300 million ($505 million) to fund genetic research into cancer and rare diseases to fund a wide-scale genomics project.

The project will be a four-year commitment, allowing scientists to carry out new research to decode 100,000 human genomes by 2017.

The Prime Minister has unveiled a new partnership between Genomics England and the company Illumina, which will deliver the infrastructure and expertise to make the plan a reality. Illumina’s services for the genome sequencing component have been secured for around £78 million. Illumina will invest around £162 million into the work in England over the four-year period, creating new jobs in genome sequencing.