China’s MGI Tech touts 10-minute genome reading with new sequencer

Shenzhen-based MGI Tech unveiled what it claims to be the world’s fastest gene sequencer, an advance that promises to help accelerate breakthroughs in cancer genomics and rare disease research.

The company said at a launch event on Tuesday that the DNBSEQ-T7+ can sequence 144 human genomes a day, or one every 10 minutes. More than twice as fast as its previous T7 model, the machine could process more than 14 terabases (Tb) of genomic data a day, it said. This was an industry-leading figure for throughput, or the amount of sequencing data a machine can produce in a given time, it added.

In comparison, leading American biotechnology company Illumina advertises throughput of up to 16 Tb per run, each lasting up to 48 hours, for its most advanced NovaSeq X Series machines.

“The T7+ is more than just a sequencer – it is a bridge between scientific discovery and real-world health outcomes,” said Duncan Yu, president of MGI Tech. “With higher throughput, improved accuracy and a smaller footprint, the T7+ empowers scientists to ask bigger questions and deliver insights faster.”

The T7+, which MGI described as a “data mining machine”, is a fully automated, compact system that supports one to four flow-cell sequencing runs. Flow cells are the plates that hold DNA molecules in place for processing.

Generally, sequencers have to trade off capacity versus the speed at which a usable result for a single sample can be produced. High-capacity machines pool samples through multiple flow cells to increase output per run, but each run takes longer to complete.