The National Institutes of Health will award nearly $80 million to support the establishment of the Genomics Research to Elucidate the Genetics of Rare Diseases (GREGoR) Consortium and the development of novel methods and approaches that help researchers identify the genetic causes of single-gene diseases. Baylor College of Medicine will be one of five clinical sites included in the consortium. The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of NIH, will fund the consortium.
"Over the past 15 years, we have made tremendous strides in the field of genomic medicine and rare disease research,” said Dr. Jennifer Posey, assistant professor of molecular and human genetics at Baylor and one of the principal investigators of the Baylor site, with Dr. Richard Gibbs and Dr. James Lupski. “Despite this, about two-thirds of rare disease families still remain without an identified genetic cause of their condition. We now have the opportunity to address this challenge head-on by harnessing new approaches to study families with rare diseases.”
Find more information on the new consortium here.