TITLE: In Silico Infection of the Human Genome
SPEAKER: William Langdon (Department of Computer Science, University College London)

ABSTRACT:

The human genetic sequence database contains
DNA sequences very like those of mycoplasma bacteria.
It appears such bacteria infect not only molecular Biology laboratories but
their genes were picked up from contaminated samples
and inserted into GenBank as if they were homo sapiens.
This suggests there is a need to clean up genomic databases.
However it appears current tools are not able to catch genes
which have jumped the silicon barrier.