tokyo

Japan is to launch a national programme to identify and map single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the Japanese population, according to a report released last week by the government's ad hoc working group on SNPs research.

The project will aim to map between 100,000 and 150,000 SNPs in two years, using samples obtained from at least 50 Japanese people. Data from other Asian populations will be added to the study at a later date.

SNPs represent the most abundant type of variation in the human genome, and can be used to map genes involved in common diseases such as diabetes and coronary heart disease.

Maps of this kind can also be used to identify individuals who are likely to be unresponsive to, or suffer side effects from, various drugs — allowing their doctors to choose the safest and most effective form of treatment for them.

The planned project will be carried out jointly by government ministries, universities and industry. It will create a public SNP database, which scientists hope will contribute to international efforts such as the SNP Consortium. This consists of 10 major pharmaceutical companies and five leading publicly funded genomics institutes, none Japanese (see Nature 398, 545; 545; 1999).

Unlike programmes led by the SNP Consortium and companies such as Genset, which are based on genomic SNPs, the Japanese project will use SNPs in coding sequences by analysing full-length complementary DNA and expressed sequence tags.

But critics question Japan's ability to meet its projected target, given its relative weakness in information processing technology and sequencing capacity, and given the lack of Japanese firms that would be able to compete with Western biotechnology companies.