Our World
in Data
Data

Cost per billion pairs of DNA sequencing

See all data and research on:
Technological Change

About this data

Cost per billion pairs of DNA sequencing
The cost of sequencing one billion base pairs of DNA, measured in US$. This data is not adjusted for inflation.
Source
National Human Genome Research Institute (2022) – with minor processing by Our World in Data
Last updated
November 28, 2023
Next expected update
November 2024
Date range
2001–2022
Unit
current US$

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) tracks the costs associated with DNA sequencing at the centers it funds. The cost-accounting data is summarized relative to two metrics: (1) "Cost per Megabase of DNA Sequence" - the cost of determining one megabase (Mb; a million bases) of DNA sequence of a specified quality; (2) "Cost per Genome" - the cost of sequencing a human-sized genome.

Retrieved on
November 28, 2023
Retrieved from
https://www.genome.gov/about-genomics/fact-sheets/DNA-Sequencing-Costs-Data
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Wetterstrand KA. DNA Sequencing Costs: Data from the NHGRI Genome Sequencing Program (GSP) Available at: www.genome.gov/sequencingcostsdata.

How we process data at Our World in Data

All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.

At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.

Read about our data pipeline

Reuse this work

  • All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
  • All data, visualizations, and code produced by Our World in Data are completely open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have the permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited.

Citations

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Cost per billion pairs of DNA sequencing”, part of the following publication: Max Roser, Hannah Ritchie and Edouard Mathieu (2023) - “Technological Change”. Data adapted from National Human Genome Research Institute. Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/cost-per-gigabase-dna-sequencing [online resource]
How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

National Human Genome Research Institute (2022) – with minor processing by Our World in Data

Full citation

National Human Genome Research Institute (2022) – with minor processing by Our World in Data. “Cost per billion pairs of DNA sequencing” [dataset]. National Human Genome Research Institute, “DNA Sequencing Costs” [original data]. Retrieved July 27, 2024 from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/cost-per-gigabase-dna-sequencing