Genomics in drug discovery: the best things come to those who wait

The year 2007 has been marked by the maturation of high-throughput technologies that combine automation and miniaturization to enable systematic surveys of genome sequence variation, gene expression and gene function. These technologies have the potential to affect drug discovery in many ways, from target identification and validation, to pinpointing the molecular variants that influence medicine response. In the current climate of declining pharmaceutical R&D productivity, these approaches offer hope, but a price tag is attached. This review covers exciting advances in the field of genomics, and discusses when to act on genomic data versus when to wait for further information.