Rethinking Healthcare  Mom's blood, dad's saliva reveal unborn
baby's genome  Posting in Healthcare  Researchers can predict
the genome of a human fetus without piercing the womb with a
large needle. Thousands of genetic disorders caused by small,
hard to find mutations could be screened.  Using just a blood
sample from a pregnant woman and saliva from the father-to-be,
researchers can reconstruct the whole genome sequence of a
unborn baby.  These findings open up the possibility of
prenatally evaluating a baby for many genetic disorders… without
invasive screening procedures that require inserting needles and
tubes into the womb or placenta.  Right now, some diagnoses are
done using fetal cells from fluid in the womb (amniocentesis) or
placental tissue (chorionic villus sampling). These can cause
miscarriages in 1% of all cases.  In 2010, scientists developed
a way to scan the unborn baby’s genome using just a small sample
of the mother’s blood. This technique utilizes the fetal DNA
floating (cell-free) in t