Pandemic puts a Gulf AI company on the cutting edge of genome research

Pandemic puts a Gulf AI company on the cutting edge of genome research

DUBAI: The blueprint for all living things, from plants and animals to microscopic viruses, is coded into their DNA and RNA — molecular structures that communicate the genetic information that determines the characteristics of all cellular organisms. Genomic sequencing studies that untangle these structures are helping scientists to understand the origins of the novel coronavirus, also known as SARS-CoV-2, as well as identify its potentially more contagious variants. Without this field of research, COVID-19 testing and the current rollout of vaccines would not have been possible. In fact, the pandemic has forced a radical advancement of our scientific understanding of the coronavirus, leading to revolutionary new mRNA vaccines created by Pfizer and Moderna. Knowledge of the virus's RNA sequence was a key factor in COVID-19's early detection, which has enabled the rapid development of diagnostic techniques. Never before have the nearly 30, 000 nucleotides of a virus been so closely examined. Genomic surveillance studies are taking place in laboratories around the world. In South Africa, it was a genomic sequencing study that uncovered the B. 1. 351 variant (also known as 501Y. V2), which the scientific community fears is particularly contagious. In the race to understand the source of the