Why updates matter
Your DNA is fixed from birth — the raw data file you uploaded will never change. But scientific understanding of what specific genetic variants mean is anything but fixed. Genomics researchers publish thousands of new studies every year, expanding our knowledge of how individual SNPs affect health, fitness, nutrition, and disease risk. A variant that wasn't known to influence any trait in 2022 may have been definitively linked to a specific phenotype by 2024.
helixXY is built to take advantage of this ongoing progress automatically. When new, validated research is published that affects how your specific variants are interpreted, your reports are updated to reflect it. You don't need to re-upload your file or take any action at all.
How the update pipeline works
Daily monitoring of new GWAS publications
helixXY continuously tracks new peer-reviewed research across major genomics databases and journals — including PubMed, the NHGRI-EBI GWAS Catalog, Nature Genetics, and the New England Journal of Medicine. New publications are ingested and assessed daily.
Validation and quality screening
Not every published study makes it into the helixXY database. New variants are evaluated for statistical significance (typically p < 5×10⁻⁸ for GWAS), sample size, population diversity of the study cohort, and replication across independent datasets. Studies that don't meet quality thresholds are tracked but not incorporated until supporting evidence is available.
Matching against your stored genetic data
Your uploaded raw data file is permanently stored in encrypted form specifically to enable this step. Validated new variants are automatically matched against your individual genotype data. Only findings for variants you actually carry will affect your reports.
Reports are automatically recalculated
Any report affected by the new variant data is re-scored and regenerated automatically. This includes recalculating polygenic risk scores, updating confidence levels, and revising the practical guidance to align with the updated evidence.
You receive an email notification
When your reports are updated, you receive an email listing exactly which reports changed and summarizing what changed in each — including a before/after score summary where applicable. A "Recently updated" badge appears on affected reports in your dashboard.
No action is needed from you. Your file stays where it is. Updates happen in the background, and your reports reflect the latest science the next time you open them.
What triggers an update
- New GWAS studies: A newly published genome-wide association study identifies a variant in your data that is linked to a health or wellness trait for the first time.
- Refined effect sizes: A larger or more diverse study updates the estimated effect size of a variant you carry, changing your polygenic risk score for a trait.
- Improved polygenic risk models: Methodological advances in how polygenic scores are calculated lead to more accurate risk estimates across the board.
- Corrections to prior findings: A replication failure or retraction causes a previously included variant to be removed or its confidence level to be downgraded.
- New trait databases added: helixXY adds an entirely new category or trait type, and your raw data contains variants relevant to that trait.
Update frequency
Reports are checked against the latest published science at least monthly. Major database updates — such as the addition of a new trait category or integration of a large new GWAS dataset — happen on a quarterly basis. You can also trigger a manual refresh of your reports at any time from the Genetic Data section of your account settings.
Not all updates change your results. Sometimes a new study simply confirms the existing scientific consensus, which increases a report's confidence level without changing the underlying conclusion. You'll still receive a notification so you know the report is current.
Email notifications
You can customize how you receive update notifications from your account settings under Settings > Notifications:
- Receive an email immediately whenever any of your reports are updated
- Receive a weekly digest summarizing all changes from the past 7 days
- Receive only significant updates — changes to a report's conclusion or confidence level
- Turn off email notifications entirely (updates still occur; you can see them in your dashboard at any time)
Update emails include a summary of each changed report with the previous and new result side by side, so you can immediately understand what shifted and why.
How to view changes in the app
To see the history of any report inside the helixXY app: go to the Reports section, open the report you want to review, and tap the History tab. The History tab shows a chronological version timeline of that report — every time it was updated, what changed, and which new studies triggered the change. This makes it easy to track how scientific understanding of a specific trait has evolved over time.