DNA microarray technology: the anticipated impact on the study of human disease.

One can imagine that, one day, there will be a general requirement that relevant array data be deposited, at the time of publication of manuscripts in which they are described, into a single site made available for the storage and analysis of array data (modeled after the GenBank submission requirements for DNA sequence information). With this system in place, one can anticipate a time when data from thousands of gene expression experiments will be available for meta-analysis, which has the potential to balance out artifacts from many individual studies, thus leading to more robust results and subtle conclusions. This will require that data adhere to some type of uniform structure and format that would ideally be independent of the particular expression technology used to generate it. The pros and cons of various publication modalities for these large electronic data sets have been discussed elsewhere [12], but, practical difficulties aside, general depositing must occur for this technology to reach the broadest range of investigators. Finally, as mentioned at the beginning of this review, it is unfortunate that this important research tool remains largely restricted to a few laboratories that have developed expertise in this area and to a growing number of commercial interests. Ultimately the real value of microarray technology will only be realized when this approach is generally available. It is hoped that issues including platforms, instrumentation, clone availability, and patents [20] will be resolved shortly, making this technology accessible to the broadest range of scientists at the earliest possible moment.