The Problem With Big DNA
It took researchers days to search through thousands of genome sequences. Now it takes just a few seconds.
by Sarah Zhang
Feb 04, 2019
3 minutes
In 2015, scientists discovered a pig in China that would set off a frantic, worldwide search. The pig carried bacteria resistant to colistin, a drug used to cure infections when almost all other drugs have failed. Colistin is an old antibiotic with sometimes severe side effects in humans. Chinese doctors didn’t even prescribe it for human patients; instead, farmers were relying on literal tons of it, used in low doses, as a growth promoter in pigs.
Bacteria are constantly crossing continents in people, animals, and food, though. In
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