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HISTORY Project was launched in 1986 by Charles DeLisi , who was then Director of the US Department Of Energy's Health and Environmental Research Programs. The goals and general strategy of the Project were outlined in a two-page memo to the Assistant Secretary in April 1986, which helped garner support from the DOE, the United States Office of Management and Budget ( OMB ) and the United States Congress , especially Senator Pete Domenici . A series of Scientific Advisory meetings, and complex negotiations with senior Federal officials resulted in a Line Item for the Project in the 1987 Presidential budget submission to the Congress. Initiation of the Project was the culmination of several years of work supported by the US Department of Energy, in particular a feasibility workshop in 1986 and a subsequent detailed description of the Human Genome Initiative in a report that led to the formal sanctioning of the initiative by the Department of Energy1 Retrieved 2005-02-03.. This 1987 report stated boldly, "The ultimate goal of this initiative is to understand the human genome" and "Knowledge of the human genome is as necessary to the continuing progress of medicine and other health sciences as knowledge of human anatomy has been for the present state of medicine." Candidate technologies were already being considered for the proposed undertaking at least as early as 19852 Retrieved 2005-02-03.. James D. Watson was Head of the National Center for Human Genome Research at the National Institutes of Health ( NIH ) in the United States starting from 1988. Largely due to his disagreement with his boss, Bernadine Healy , over the issue of patenting genes, he was forced to resign in 1992. He was replaced by Francis Collins in April 1993 and the name of the Center was changed to the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) in 1997. The $3-billion Project was formally founded in 1990 by the United States Department Of Energy and the U.S. National Institutes Of Health , and was expected to take 15 years. In addition to the United States , the international Consortium comprised geneticists in China , France , Germany , Japan , and the United Kingdom . Due to widespread international cooperation and advances in the field of Genomics (especially in Sequence Analysis ), as well as huge advances in computing technology, a rough draft of the genome was finished in 2003 (announced jointly by former US president Bill Clinton and British Prime Minister Tony Blair on June 26 , 2003 ), two years earlier than planned. President Clinton had already awarded the Citizen's Medal to DeLisi for his seminal role in the Project, in January 2003, before the completion of the Project was announced. THE ROLE OF CELERA GENOMICS In 1998, an identical, privately funded quest was launched by the American researcher Craig Venter and his firm Celera Genomics . The $300 million Celera effort was intended to proceed at a faster pace and at a fraction of the cost of the roughly $3 billion Taxpayer-funded Project . Celera used a newer, riskier technique called Whole Genome Shotgun Sequencing , which had been used to sequence bacterial genomes. Celera initially announced that it would seek patent protection on "only 200-300" genes, but later amended this to seeking "intellectual property protection" on "fully-characterized important structures" amounting to 100-300 targets. Contrary to its public promises, the firm eventually filed patent applications on 6,500 whole or partial genes . Celera also promised to publish their findings in accordance with the terms of the 1996 " Bermuda Statement ," by releasing new data quarterly (the HGP released its new data daily), although, unlike the publicly-funded project, they would not permit free redistribution or commercial use of the data. In March 2000, President Clinton announced that the genome sequence could not be patented, and should be made freely available to all researchers. The statement sent Celera's stock plummeting and dragged down the biotech-heavy Nasdaq . The biotech sector lost about $50 billion in market capitalization in two days. Although the working draft was announced in June 2000, it was not until February 2001 that Celera and the HGP scientists published details of their drafts. Special issues of '' Nature '' (which published the publicly-funded project's scientific paper) and '' Science '' (which published Celera's paper) described the methods used to produce the draft sequence and offered analysis of the sequence. These drafts are hoped to comprise a 'scaffold' of 90 % of the genome, with gaps to be filled later. The competition proved to be very good for the project. The rivals agreed to pool their data, but the agreement fell apart when Celera refused to deposit its data in the unrestricted public database Genbank. Celera had incorporated the public data into their genome, but forbade the public effort to use Celera data. On 14 April 2003 , a joint press release announced that the project had been completed by both groups, with 99 % of the genome sequenced with 99.99 % accuracy. Each draft sequence has been checked at least four to five times to increase 'depth of coverage' or accuracy. About 47% of the draft were high-quality sequences. The final version will have been checked eight to nine times giving an error rate of 1 in 10,000 bases. HGP is one of several international Genome Project s aimed at sequencing the DNA of a specific organism. While the human DNA sequence offers the most tangible benefits, important developments in biology and medicine are predicted as a result of the sequencing of Model Organisms , including Mice , Fruit Flies , Zebrafish , Yeast , Nematodes , and many microbial organisms and parasites. In October 2004, researchers from the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium (IHGSH) of the HGP announced a new estimate of 20,000 to 25,000 genes in the human genome3. Previously 30,000 to 40,000 had been predicted, while estimates at the start of the project reached up to as high as 2,000,000. GOALS The goals of the original HGP were not only to determine all 3 billion base pairs in the human genome with a minimal error rate, but also to identify all the genes in this vast amount of data. This part of the project is still ongoing although a preliminary count indicates about 30,000 genes in the human genome, which is far fewer than predicted by most scientists. Another goal of the HGP was to develop faster, more efficient methods for DNA Sequencing and Sequence Analysis and the transfer of these technologies to industry. The sequence of the human s have been developed to analyse the data, because the data itself is difficult to interpret without them. The process of identifying the boundaries between genes and other features in raw DNA sequence is called Genome Annotation and is the domain of Bioinformatics . While expert biologists make the best annotators, their work proceeds slowly, and computer programs are increasingly used to meet the high-throughput demands of genome sequencing projects. The best current technologies for annotation make use of statistical models that take advantage of parallels between DNA sequences and human Language , using concepts from computer science such as Formal Grammar s. All humans have unique gene sequences, therefore the data published by the HGP does not represent the exact sequence of each and every individual's genome. It is the combined genome of a small number of anonymous donors. The HGP genome is a scaffold for future work in identifying differences between individuals. Most of the current effort in identifying differences between individuals involves Single Nucleotide Polymorphism s and the HapMap . BENEFITS Clear practical results of the project emerged even before the work was finished. For example, a number of companies, such as Myriad Genetics started offering easy ways to administer genetic tests that can show predisposition to a variety of illnesses, including Breast Cancer , Blood Clotting , Cystic Fibrosis , Liver diseases and many others. There are also many tangible benefits for biological scientists. For example, a researcher investigating a certain form of Cancer may have narrowed down his search to a particular gene. By visiting the human genome database on the worldwide web, this researcher can examine what other scientists have written about this gene, including (potentially) the three-dimensional structure of its product, its function(s), its evolutionary relationships to other human genes, or to genes in mice or yeast or fruit flies, possible detrimental mutations, interactions with other genes, body tissues in which this gene is activated, diseases associated with this gene... The list of datatypes is long, one reason why Bioinformatics is so challenging. The work on interpretation of genome data is still in its initial stages. In the future the knowledge gained by the understanding of the genome will boost the fields of Medicine and Biotechnology , potentially leading to cures for Cancer , Alzheimer's Disease , and other diseases. The analysis of similarities between DNA sequences from different organisms is also opening new avenues in the study of the theory of Evolution . In many cases, evolutionary questions can now be framed in terms of Molecular Biology ; indeed, many major evolutionary milestones (the emergence of the Ribosome and Organelle s, the development of embryos with body plans, the Vertebrate Immune System ) can be related to the molecular level. Many questions about the similarities and differences between humans and our closest relatives (the Primate s, and indeed the other Mammal s) are expected to be illuminated by the data from this project. WHOSE GENOME WAS SEQUENCED? ''This answer is posted as supplied by Dr. Marvin Stodolsky, U.S. DOE Office of Biological and Environmental Research, Office of Science. This statement is believed to be in the Public Domain since it is a work of the United States government.'' Whose genome was sequenced in the public (HGP) and private project? REFERENCES
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