Ion Torrent CEO and chairman Jonathan Rothberg holds a semiconductor sequencing chip that will be used in the new Proton semi-conductor based genome sequencing machine in Guilford, Connecticut, January 5, 2012. After years of predictions that the "$1,000 genome" - a read-out of a person's complete genetic information for about the cost of a dental crown - was just around the corner, a U.S. company is announcing January 10, 2012 that it has achieved that milestone and taken the technology several steps ahead. The new genome-sequencing machine is 1,000 times more powerful than existing technology, says Rothberg. Picture taken January 5, 2012. To match Insight HEALTH-GENOME/ REUTERS/Michelle McLoughlin (UNITED STATES - Tags: SCIENCE TECHNOLOGY BUSINESS HEALTH)