For the better part of two decades, Linda Avey, the less celebrated founder of startup 23andMe, toiled away in the life sciences industry, pondering how to make the power of its discoveries accessible. Now, thanks to a well-timed partnership and the falling cost of genetic testing, she could be poised to help make DNA a bigger part of the way people manage their health.

Avey’s business partner, former health-care industry investment analyst Anne Wojcicki, garnered attention this spring when she married Google («www.businessweek.com») co-founder «investing.businessweek.com» in a secret Bahamas ceremony. Google invested $3.9 million in «investing.businessweek.com», which launched a home genetic testing service Nov. 16, and Brin made a $2.6 million loan that the company has since repaid.

Turned off by what she viewed as greed in the pharmaceutical industry, Wojcicki has been casting around since 2005 to become involved in a venture that would affect people’s health in a positive way. She previously tried to start a company called Catalytic Health with social entrepreneur David Green that aimed to provide low-cost medical products and drugs to the world’s poor.

Avey arrives at the problem of unlocking genetic information to help guide health care from a different perspective. She got hooked on biology at Augustana College in her home state of South Dakota, then spent more than 20 years in sales and business development at biotech companies, including Applied Biosystems Group («www.businessweek.com»), Affymetrix («www.businessweek.com»), and «investing.businessweek.com».

“I got frustrated a lot more information wasn’t trickling out to consumers,” she says. Avey recalls holiday parties those years where guests would make cocktail chatter with her husband, an executive at Merrill Lynch («www.businessweek.com»), then “roll their eyes that they had to talk to this boring science person the rest of the evening.” She even tried writing a children’s book on genetics in the 1990s. Revolutionary Research

Few scan the room when they’re talking to Avey today. On Nov. 29, the World Economic Forum named 23andMe a winner of its annual “Technology Pioneer” awards, which recognize companies in biotech, health, energy, and computing that develop products with the potential for far-reaching impact on business and society. 23andMe sells a $1,000 home DNA test that requires customers to spit in a vial, then mail it to a lab where it’s tested for hundreds of thousands of genetic variations. Consumers use 23andMe’s Web site to explore their ancestry and predisposition to diseases.

Eventually, the company hopes to amass enough customers to make it economically feasible to study reactions to drugs that occur in only small percentages of the population. “There’s always been this long talked-about area of personalized medicine, and we’re never going to get there until we get enough people to study,” says Avey. “It’s really up in the air when you take a drug whether or not you’re going to have an adverse reaction…23and Me just wants to try another way of doing research.” Increased Risks

But making genetic information accessible on the Web raises thorny questions. What are the societal implications of knowing whether we are especially likely to contract diseases? Should doctors play a greater role in disclosing the meaning of people’s genes? And will DNA test-kits that cost $1,000 or more for even the most basic data create a “DNA divide” in which only the affluent are privy to information that could help them lead healthier lives?

“Genomics is statistics,” says John Halamka, a doctor and chief information officer at Harvard Medical School. If a population’s chance of contracting a disease is 1%, and a patient’s genetics reveal a 20% higher than average risk of getting it, that’s still only a 1.2% chance. “Would you change your lifestyle?” he asks. “Trying to build that into a product or service to communicate what these things actually mean is tough.”

Then there’s the question of how to break bad news, which could get more important as 23andMe and others scan more of their customers’ genetic material. “For many results, as long as you wrap them in really good educational material, it’s O.K.,” says Halamka, who runs an electronic medical records project at Boston’s «investing.businessweek.com» that sends patients most lab results via the Web. But for an HIV or cancer diagnosis, “those things need to be communicated orally between patient and doctor.”

There’s a wide gap between a fatal disease diagnosis and the type of information 23andMe is disclosing, such as whether customers possess genetic variations that increase their risk of diabetes, Crohn’s disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and heart disease. Still, Avey admits the company’s service “is not for everybody. There’s probably going to be a different comfort level people have learning about themselves,” she says. For consumers who are curious—and rich—enough to do so, 23andMe could help change the way they relate to their genetic blueprints.

Good Vibrations, the pioneering San Francisco sex toy retailer that had stumbled recently due to Internet competition, is being sold to a nationwide distributor of adult products, a move that will save the store and help it expand in other cities.

Officials with GVA-TWN - a Cleveland firm that operates its own adult stores in the Midwest and has been distributing adult products since the 1960s - said Thursday that they are acquiring Good Vibrations for an undisclosed sum.

The San Francisco firm said the pending deal with GVA-TWN will allow it to restock its shelves for the holiday season. “The stores are getting restocked even as we speak,” Good Vibrations board member Carol Queen said Thursday afternoon.

GVA-TWN plans to use its financial muscle to open Good Vibrations stores in other cities. “In the long term or medium term, this will allow Good Vibrations to do something we’ve wanted to do for quite a while, which is look at expansion into other parts of California and the U.S.,” Queen said.

Officials from the two companies said there are no plans to lay off any of Good Vibrations’ 60 workers or to change its management. Good Vibrations once was a worker-owned cooperative but converted to a traditional corporate structure in 2006. Many of its employees own shares of the company, and officials said those workers will receive some of the proceeds of the sale.

Good Vibrations got its start in the 1970s as one of the first companies to sell vibrators and other sexual products in a setting that was welcoming to women and that conveyed an educational, positive view of sexuality. Over the years, it added stores in Berkeley and Massachusetts, a second store in San Francisco, and an Internet sales operation.

GVA-TWN hopes to benefit from Good Vibrations’ experience with marketing to women and couples.

Good Vibrations, for its part, had been seeking an infusion of capital to help it overcome recent losses related to a drop in its Internet sales.

“The merger is going to stabilize Good Vibrations financially immediately,” Queen said.

“It’s a good fit for both businesses,” said Joel Kaminsky, chief operating officer of GVA-TWN. “Our strengths are infrastructure, inventory and financial strength. And they have a lot to bring to the table in helping us reach out to women and couples of all genders, and in training our staff.”

The company initially viewed the Internet as fertile ground for sales. At one point, it was generating two-thirds of its revenue from catalogs and the Internet.

But Good Vibrations’ online sales suffered as giant Web retailers like Amazon and Drugstore.com started selling sensual items. The company also was hit by competition from a growing number of individuals running adult e-commerce sites from their home computers with virtually no overhead.

Earlier this month, Good Vibrations posted an open letter on its Web site seeking investors to help it survive.

With more than 50 retail stores in the Midwest and revenue in the “high eight figures,” GVA-TWN is much larger than Good Vibrations, which saw sales of $11.9 million last year.

Its retail culture also has been very different from that of Good Vibrations. “They are generally the kind of stores that Good Vibrations says it is not … more porn-heavy, oriented to male shoppers,” Queen said.

Despite its traditional male orientation, GVA-TWN has followed the rest of the adult products industry in recent years in eyeing the market potential of female customers.

And Good Vibrations has been an acknowledged leader is reaching that market.

“When the Rabbit Vibrator got onto ‘Sex and the City,’ the writing was on the wall,” Queen said. “It became clear it wasn’t just guys in raincoats going into sex stores. I see this relationship (with GVA-TWN) in that light.”

E-mail Ilana DeBare at idebare@sfchronicle.com.

MURDERED schoolgirl Vicky Hamilton was finally laid to rest at an emotional service today, nearly 17 years after she disappeared.

Family and friends gathered to remember Vicky, who was 15-years old, when she was last seen waiting for a bus in Bathgate in February 1991.

Her remains were uncovered at a terraced house in Margate, Kent, nearly three weeks ago.

An eerie silence fell on the picturesque Redding Parish Church, near Falkirk, when Vickys coffin arrived, draped in flowers at around 11am.

On one side the flowers were arranged to say Vicky, and on the other to say sister.

Michael Hamilton arrived in the first of the family hearses, accompanied by other family members. Vickys siblings Sharon, Lindsay and Lee, arrived shortly afterwards in a separate hearse and entered the church arm-in-arm, each carrying a red rose.

Inside, the Rev Geoffrey Smart said a battle against evil had been lost on the day Vicky died.

He described Vickys murder as a cruel, callous and evil act.

He said: We come to remember Vicky as she was a young girl with her whole life ahead of her, who was taken from us by this terrible act of evil.

The church was completely packed out with mourners, with all the pews filled and people standing in every available space.

Vickys siblings Sharon, Lee and Lindsay were sitting together at the front of the church. Her fatherMichael was at the front on the other side of the aisle.

The church organist was playing a version of I Will Always Love You, by Whitney Houston. The minister continued: Vicky was a much loved daughter, sister, granddaughter, half sister and niece.

She has been sorely missed by all these relatives all and the rest of her family and friends over these years.
Vickys family said her disappearance had ripped the family apart, but were comforted by the fact they could now lay her to rest.

The minister added: Her family were robbed of seeing Vicky grow up as all their hopes and expectations for Vickys future were taken from them.

The judicial process will go on and help give some peace to all who mourn Vickys tragic and distressing death.

As Christians, we are meant to have a forgiving spirit, yet forgiveness is a two-way street and we have seen no signs of contrition either for the evil deed or for putting a family through the hell of these last 16 years of uncertainty, worry and fear, which also caused the untimely death of Vickys mum.

So today all we can do is thank God that throughout this time of uncertainty and fear Vicky was safely in His loving hands.

Yet before this Vicky was forced to face something that nobody should ever have to face, especially a young, vulnerable teenage girl.

However, he added: We must not dwell on this today, but try to see beyond its darkness and focus on the light of our Christian belief, which tells us that Vicky is safe and secure in heaven, together with her granny and her mum, in order that Gods gracious love might take from us any feelings which might undermine our own lives.

When we are able to do this we stop such evil from gaining any kind of victory over us, as we unite in Gods love.

A young man dressed in full military uniform and ceremonial white gloves stood outside the church to greet mourners, including Vickys uncle Eric Hamilton.

Mourners laid wreaths and flowers on the grass outside before entering the church while people stopped in the street to watch.

The minister said: Today, let us all find resolution and peace as we give Vicky her Christian service and burial in order that you can then move on in your lives.

Jesus brought the light of Gods love to humanity in many different and powerful ways when He walked this earth, and through His Spirit He still does this today.

He paid tribute to the bright bubbly girl who was a popular pupil at Westquarter Primary School and Graeme High School, and thanked the people of Scotland on behalf of Vickys family for their support since her disappearance. During the service the mourners sang All Things Bright and Beautiful and How Great Thou Art, and Westlifes You Raise Me Up was played at the request of Vickys father, Michael.

The cortege then passed her old house on its way to New Grandsable Cemetery, near Vickys former home on Ward Avenue, Redding, in a plot where her father also wishes to be buried.

At Vickys graveside, Mr Smart said: We gather to commit Vickys body to the ground, knowing that after her death some 16 years ago, Vickys immortal soul lived on in Gods eternal Kingdom of love.

The souls of the innocents are in Gods hands, no torment will touch them, for they are at peace.

Almighty and ever loving God, Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ longed for us to know how we should live and love and grow, and chose a young person to show us some glimpses here of heaven.

When youngsters suffer pain and cry and lose their hold on life and die, while we must grieve and wonder why Christ keeps them safe in heaven.

So we give thanks to God for Vicky, now silent to the world, yet all these years, with her hand in hand in Christs, her Lord, and with her mum and her granny, Vicky has lived on in heaven.

Lord, tell Vicky how well always care, and miss the years we longed to share, until in answer to our prayer, we meet Vicky again in heaven.

Vickys remains were found alongside those of 18-year-old Dinah McNicol, from Essex, buried in the garden of a house in Margate, Kent. Peter Tobin, 61, has been charged with Vickys murder.