One Day Only: A $99 Genetic Test

In honor of National DNA Day (or in a blatant-yet-brilliant marketing move, depending on your perspective), personal genetic testing firm 23andMe is offering $99 genetic testing. The fee covers the company’s “Complete Edition” testing. This doesn’t mean full-genome sequencing, since 23andMe uses DNA microarrays to determine which version of 550,000 SNPs (single-letter changes in your genome) you carry. But it does include information on the following…

• Ancestry
  • Relative Finder
  • Maternal Line
  • Paternal Line (for men only)
  • Ancestry Painting
  • Global Similarity
• Health (148 reports)
  • Carrier Status (24)
  • Disease Risk (12)
  • Drug Response (9)
  • Traits (10)
  • Cutting-edge Research (93)

…as well as the ability to download raw data about the SNPs present in your mitochondrial and Y chromosome DNA, as well as data for nearly 600,000 other positions.

Pretty cool for $99–at least for a bio geek like me!