When Biology Lapped Silicon
The cost of sequencing a human genome versus the cost of computing. For years they fell in lockstep — then biology broke away and plunged far faster than Moore's Law.
The story
For years, two of the most important cost curves in science fell in near-perfect lockstep. The cost of computing dropped along Moore's Law — halving roughly every 18 months — and the cost of sequencing a human genome fell right alongside it. From the $100-million genome of 2001 to a few hundred thousand dollars by 2007, biology was simply keeping pace with silicon.
Then, in 2008, "next-generation" massively-parallel sequencing changed everything. The cost of reading a genome went into free-fall — far steeper than Moore's Law — crashing to under $1,000 within a few years. For the first time, biology had outrun the microchip, and the two lines that had been glued together split apart on screen. The moment biology lapped silicon.