Monoclonal antibodies target inflammatory bowel disease.

Abstract

may still have a similar function. Ajit Varki, MD, of the University of California at San Diego, said that deciphering the relevance of the many differences throughout the two entire genomes will take years. “Most of the differences at the genomic level are going to be meaningless and have no consequence,” he said. “On the other hand, it could well be that one of the most significant differences of all is a single base pair change in the promoter of some gene somewhere,” he said. Willunveiling the full chimpanzeegenomehavemuchofan impactonhuman healthanddisease?Somescientistsarebettingitwill.Lifestylechanges inrecenthumanevolutionhavecertainlycontributed tosomehealthproblems,sothechimpanzeegenomecouldprovideagoodcontrast. There are also several striking biomedicaldifferencesbetweenhumansandchimpanzees, suchashowtheyareaffectedby thepathogensthatcauseAIDSormalaria. As human beings learned to manipulate their environment over the millennia, they have relaxed selection pressure on all kinds of things, explained Olson. “We get obese, we don’t have enough exercise, and we have all of these well-known associated health problems,”hesaid.Chimpanzees,ontheother hand, arebiologically similar tohumans, but have not undergone the same longterm relaxation of selection pressure. “It may be that the chimpanzee is our best bet,” said Olson. “It may provide biochemical, anatomical, and pathological models for [the] kind of characteristics humans would be medically better off having.”