Affymetrix Releases Axiom Genome-Wide Pan-African Array
13 October 2011 - 12:00AM
Business Wire
Affymetrix®, Inc. (NASDAQ:AFFX) today announced at the ICHG/ASHG
annual conference in Montreal, the worldwide launch of the Axiom®
Genome-Wide Pan-African Array, the first commercial product to
maximize genomic coverage of both common and rare alleles in
populations of African ancestry, including West African, East
African, and African American. The Axiom Solution is the only
microarray family of products to provide a complete set of
population-optimized arrays for all three HapMap populations:
Western European (CEU), East Asian (ASI), and Yoruba (YRI). Each
array is strategically designed to address the unique haplotype
structure of these populations to ensure high genomic coverage and
statistical power.
Affymetrix Axiom Array Plates (Photo:
Business Wire)
“The poor genomic coverage of currently available commercial
arrays in African populations has significantly impacted our
ability to understand the genetic factors that underlie the
increased risk of African Americans for diseases such as cancer
(prostate, breast, and colon) and cardiovascular and pulmonary
disorders,” said Dr. Rick Kittles, Associate Professor of Medicine
and Director of the Institute of Human Genetics at the University
of Illinois at Chicago. “We are currently using the Axiom
Pan-African Array for prostate cancer, sickle-cell disease, and
drug response research. With greater access to rare variants and
increased coverage, I hope to gain better insights into new disease
mechanisms.”
“The marked improvement in genomic coverage of the Axiom Array
is of enormous utility in our attempts to link genetic information
and the delivery of personalized medicine,” said Dr. Joe G.N.
Garcia, Earl M. Bane Professor of Medicine and Vice President for
Health Affairs at the University of Illinois. “We anticipate that
information derived from the discovery of important variants which
modify risk, modulate responses to therapy, and drive the severity
of disease in susceptible populations will be rapidly utilized
within the University of Illinois Hospital and Health Sciences
System to reduce health disparities.
Until now, studies of African American and African populations
have been underrepresented in disease association studies because
commercially available arrays of these populations were not
optimized for the complex haplotype patterns of African genomes.
The Axiom Pan-African Array offers ~ 90 percent coverage of YRI
alleles with minor allele frequency (MAF) ≥2.0 percent. In
addition, it has been extensively validated in four African
populations from the HapMap collection, including the Luhya from
western Kenya (LWK), Maasai from eastern Kenya (MWK), Yoruba from
Ibadan, Nigeria, and the African Ancestry in the Southwest USA
(ASW). In all cases, the Axiom Pan-African Array offers an
incremental increase of 15-20 percent genomic coverage compared to
other commercial arrays.
“African populations have a greater number of smaller haplotype
blocks and singletons than European populations and thus require a
more sophisticated array design strategy to achieve genomic
coverage comparable to levels provided for European populations,”
said Andy Last, Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial
Officer at Affymetrix. “With the Axiom platform we have an
unmatched capability to deliver population-optimized
genotyping arrays to ensure that clinical researchers have
specialized and cost effective tools to better investigate genetic
susceptibility and health disparities in understudied
populations.”
The Axiom Pan-African Array was designed by leveraging over 11
million common and rare genomic markers within the Axiom Genomic
Database, the industry's largest supply of validated genomic
markers. The array contains more than 2.2 million informative
markers that are proven to be heterozygous in the African genome,
thus maximizing the analysis of each sample. Compared to competing
arrays with a similar number of markers, it has the highest
coverage of variants in important biological categories such as the
National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), Catalog of
Published Genome-Wide Association Studies, Sanger Cancer Genome
Census genes, Major Histocompatibilty Complex (MHC) genes,
cardiovascular genes, and immune and inflammation pathway genes.
The array also offers coverage across chromosomes X and Y, the
mitochondrial genome, and drug metabolism genes.
The complete Axiom Genotyping Solution consists of Axiom
Genome-Wide Pan-African Array Plates, the new Axiom 2.0 Reagent
Kits, and the new Genotyping Console 4.1 for automated allele
calling and quality control. The Axiom Array Plates are used on the
automated target preparation station and GeneTitan® Instrument for
hands-free processing.
About Affymetrix
Affymetrix technology is used by the world's top pharmaceutical,
diagnostic, and biotechnology companies, as well as leading
academic, government, and nonprofit research institutes. More than
2,100 systems have been shipped around the world, and more than
23,500 peer-reviewed papers have been published using the
technology. Affymetrix is headquartered in Santa Clara, Calif., and
has manufacturing facilities in Santa Clara, Cleveland, Ohio, and
Singapore. The company has about 900 employees worldwide and
maintains sales and distribution operations across Europe, Asia,
and Latin America. For more information about Affymetrix, please
visit http://www.affymetrix.com.
Forward-looking statements
All statements in this press release that are not historical are
"forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 21E of
the Securities Exchange Act as amended, including statements
regarding Affymetrix' "expectations," "beliefs," "hopes,"
"intentions," "strategies," or the like. Such statements are
subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results
to differ materially for Affymetrix from those projected. These and
other risk factors are discussed in Affymetrix' Form 10-K for the
year ended December 31, 2010, and other SEC reports for subsequent
quarterly periods.
NOTE: Affymetrix, and the Affymetrix logo, are trademarks or
registered trademarks of Affymetrix, Inc.
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