Canada to participate in HapMap project

Canadian researchers will be participating in a $100-million project to speed the discovery of genes related to common diseases such as asthma, cancer, diabetes and heart disease. The International HapMap Project is a public-private, international consortium involving researchers from Canada (led Dr Thomas Hudson of McGill Univ), the US, Japan, China and the UK. Funding for Canada’s participation comes from Genome Canada and Genome Quebec. The three-year project is aimed at charting variations within the human genome. Researchers will use DNA collected from blood samples of people in Nigeria, China, the US and Japan. Samples will be processed and stored at the Coriell Institute for Medical Research, Camden NJ. Results from analysis of the samples will be freely available via the Internet. In addition to public funding, private support will be coordinated by the SNP Consortium, Deerfield IL. The Wellcome Trust is providing charitable funding from the UK….