Genomics & Health. Molecular and Digital Technologies in Care Settings

Organized by Catherine Bourgain, Claire Beaudevin and Théau Brigand

Campus Condorcet-EHESS Building  / room A527
2 Cours des humanités 93300 Aubervilliers
monthly session, first Friday, 13:30-16:30

Synopsis - In the wake of the Human Genome Project, genomics technologies have been the focus of major investment, driven by the promise of a biomedical revolution. The term 'genomic technologies' is now used to describe a vast array of machines (sequencers) and associated devices (chips, consumables, software, bioinformatics algorithms, etc.) used to characterise DNA sequences. These technologies are generic and cross-disciplinary, and used in a wide range of healthcare settings: the same machine can process different biological samples (blood, saliva, tumour, etc.) and analyse variations in the sequence of a few genes or a person's entire genome.
In France, these technologies were at first used in an experimental manner in healthcare,. Now, they are being developed and routinised on a national scale, and have recently been the subject of public policies targeting rare diseases (Plans Maladies Rares), then cancers (Plans Cancer), and finally a broad spectrum of diseases (Plan France Médecine Génomique 2025, PFMG2025). In the latter plan, the same genomics platform can be used to sequence patients' genomes (in search of diagnoses or therapeutic guidelines) for arterial diseases, leukaemia, autoimmune diseases or heart rhythm disorders.
In this seminar, we will look at the contemporary routinisation of so-called innovative genomic technologies.

See the updated program of the academic year, on the EHESS website