Too Many Roads Not Taken in Biomarker Discovery: The Story of Missing Tools

The draft sequence of the human genome was completed in 2000, and scientists, funding agencies, and industry all claimed at the time that this groundbreaking accomplishment would translate into benefits for modern medicine by identifying “druggable” protein targets. Surprisingly, today a majority of the research remains focused on a small number of proteins that were identified before the sequencing of the human genome. The fact that protein research has not changed despite the “genomic revolution” highlights 3 important questions. First, has the Human Genome Project produced the “fruits” we thought it would? Second, why do scientists continue to study the same proteins that were identified in the pre–human genome era? Finally, how can we encourage the study of the novel proteins that have been revealed as a result of the Human Genome Project?These questions and some potential solutions are discussed by Edwards et al. in the commentary “Too Many Roads Not Taken” (1). These authors focused on research surrounding kinases, nuclear receptors, and ion channels, all of which are major contributors in the development of disease and are key targets for drug-discovery programs. In a bibliometric analysis, Edwards et al. discovered …