Abstract
Deciphering the sequence of the human genome is the molecular biology equivalent of landing a man on the moon. The project was discussed as early as 1985 and officially began as an international consortium of laboratories in 1990 with a projected completion date of 2005. Original countries participating in the Human Genome Project (HGP) included the United States, Great Britain, France, and Japan, with China and Germany joining the effort at a later date. Recently, a privately funded effort by Craig Venter's Celera Corporation promised to finish the genome and release it to the public in only three years. In February, 2001, Venter kept his promise and Celera's draft sequence of the human genome was published in The draft sequence of the publicly funded HGP was published in the same week in These draft sequences are a "rough draft" of the entire human genome and will require more work to close gaps and orient sequence fragments before a "finished" genome sequence can be made available.