This short article discusses research conducted by the University of British Columbia that explored effects of different drugs on many different strains of yeast. It is not a little known fact that any given drug could affect different people in different ways. Anything from blood pressure medication to an anti-depressant to an illicit drug can be experienced differently and cause a plethora of different side effects. In fact, it's not unusual for someone who is looking for relief from some kind of ailment to have to try several different drugs before they find one that allows them to get the desired effects they need without too many negative side effects. This is especially true of psychiatric drugs- for example, an anti-depressant that helps one person feel better, focus, and have more energy may make another person foggy, more miserable, and unable to get out of bed. This experiment involved taking 6000 different strains of yeast and testing their reactions to 5000 different drugs. The results showed that there were around 50 different ways that each strain might react to a different drug. Each of these reactions represents a different gene signature. Because 50 is a relatively small number compared to 6000 different yeast strains, associate professor Guri Giaever believes that this research not only indicates that we will one day be able to use someone's gene signature to predict how they will react to different drugs, eliminating the need to bounce between medicines before finding one that works for them, but also may provide the first steps to mapping possible reactions. The information gathered in this experiment may also prove useful to future cancer research.
(Secondary article: http://www.nature.com/nrd/journal/v1/n1/full/nrd705.html )
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