Talk:Human Genome Project/Archive 1

bias towards Celera Genomics
While costing 300 million, as opposed to 3 billion for the public project, Celera's data was of very limited usefullness. http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/25/ -- (unknown commenter)

I agree there is pro-Celera bias in that text, with respect to the quality of the shotgun-sequencing technique. In addition, there was more bias in this quote:

'Celera had announced from the start its intent to make their genome freely available like that of the publicly-funded HGP, and in line with the "Bermuda Statement" (Feb 1996), made freely available to the public, 24 hours a day.'

This is disingenuous. According to Sir John Sulston in _The Common Thread_, Celera took varying positions, as time went on, on how open they would be with their data. Celera's initial announcement noted that they intended to release their data 'on a quarterly basis', which is not comparable to the daily releases of the HGP. While doing this, they announced that they would be "seeking patent protection on 'only 200-300' genes", which later became "intellectual property protection on 'fully characterized important structures' amounting to 100-300 targets". To call all that 'freely available' requires qualification, in my opinion.

I've rewritten that section, hopefully it's little more accurate now (or at least more fact-based!)  The quotes are from Sir John Sulston's _The Common Thread_. (btw 24.127.183.241 is me; I'd forgotten to log in first.)

Another thing -- the brief mention of taxpayer funding in the Celera block should probably be moved to its own paragraph. It's important to note that the HGP was an international effort with funding from other sources, too, not just US taxpayers. That line, in its current placement as part of the Celera-discussion block, feels like it's anti-government axe-grinding on behalf of Celera.

To be honest, I'd argue that the Celera paragraphs should be a separate section, I think. -- Jmason 17:41, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

I think it is a pretty good article - provides lots of information for my essay!!

International Project
The HGP was an international project; however the current article text doesn't mention anything apart from the US government funding bodies until 4 paragraphs in, with a mention of an unspecified international consortium. That'd be good to fix, too. -- Jmason 21:38, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

also worth noting
that this article is contested by creationsists, as according to them, evolution is unverifiable, and there exists no hard evidence for it, because this artcile doesn't really exist, and the human genome was never sequenced.. ..If you don't agree, you might want to take it up with them lodge complaints here Of course, I'm biased, silly me, I believe in DNA, I'm such a day dreamer--Bah' 16:37, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Using the logo
Can we use the human genome project logo? - Samsara contrib talk 05:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Sure, when you upload the images tag it with logo and include information on where you downloaded the image.--nixie 05:20, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the quick reply. Unfortunately, I've run out of wiki-time for tonight (it's 5.30am ;) ). - Samsara contrib talk 05:29, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Human genome is Science Collaboration of the Week
Just to let you know that Human genome has been voted Science Collaboration of the Week. - Samsara contrib talk 10:32, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Globalize

 * The contributions of non-US research to the Human Genome Project - a US-led but international effort - seems to be under-represented in the article.
 * see http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/research/centers.shtml
 * also see http://www.hugo-international.org/
 * Bwithh 21:56, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

This is info from the major center for this research in the UK;

Formerly the Sanger Centre, the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute was founded in 1993 by the Wellcome Trust and the UK Medical Research Council (MRC). The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute is a non-trading, non-profit making registered charity involved in biomedical research. The vast majority of our funding is now provided by the Wellcome Trust, who announced in October 2001 an award of 300 million pounds sterling (430 million US dollars) to support the Institute from 2001 to 2006.

Its from the web site http://www.sanger.ac.uk/ and i'm looking for more global input.Hypnosadist 22:23, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Here are more groups involved in the international research and funding effort.

HEALTH RESEARCH BOARD, a government funder from ireland.http://www.hrb.ie/

GENOSCOPE a french government institution. History 18 December 1996: Creation of a Public Interest Group ("Groupement d'intérêt public", GIP) named "Centre national de Séquençage" (CNS, also named Genoscope) for 10 years (Official Journal, 1 January 1997). November 1997: Beginning of activities in newly-renovated premises in Evry. 1 July 2002: Integration of Genoscope within a new GIP, "Consortium National de Recherche en Génomique" (CNRG), created for 12 years, which also includes the Centre National de Génotypage (CNG) and the Réseau National des Génopoles (RNG). http://www.genoscope.cns.fr/

ACADEMY of FINLAND. The Academy of Finland provides funding for high-quality scientific research, serves as an expert in science and science policy, and strengthens the position of science and research. The Academy is committed to increasing public understanding of science through science events and science weeks, as well as through the Academy of Finland Annual Science Competition for Senior Secondary Students. http://www.aka.fi/

The AUSTRAILIAN GOVERNMENT also was a funder of this project.Hypnosadist 23:30, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

NPOV Tag?
Why is there an NPOV tag?
 * FIIK; User:Physicq210 added it without an explanatory section on the talk page, which (IMHO) is Bad Form; I'm tempted to remove the tag unless something shows up on here. --moof 01:43, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Agreed -- 08:39, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Remove NPOV tag unless inserter has clear explanation in talk page. Crum375 00:08, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Fortune Teller
Regarding the following paragraph in the artice :"In the future the knowledge gained by the understanding of the genome will boost the fields of medicine and biotechnology, eventually leading to cures for cancer, Alzheimer's disease and other diseases."

How can you tell the future? How do you know for sure that it WILL LEAD TO A CURE??? I think this should be removed unless the author wants to cite evidence of his or her unique knowledge of the future.

im writing an essay, so are they saying that they will be able clone fruit? ive heard they might be able to soon

(Above comments unsigned)

In response to this, how about the following as a suggested edit:


 * It is anticipated that detailed knowledge of the human genome will provide new avenues for advances in medicine and biotechnology. Among the areas of clinical interest considered likely to benefit from genome information are the etiologies for cancers and Alzheimer's disease, possibly leading in the long term to significant advances in the management of these diseases. While talk of 'cures' for such diseases may be considered premature, deeper understanding of the disease processes at the level of molecular biology will be of utility value in determining therapeutic procedures. Given the established importance of DNA in molecular biology and its central role in determining the fundamental operation of cellular processes, it is likely that expanded knowledge in this area will facilitate medical advances in numerous areas of clinical interest that may not have been possible without them.

Someone let me know if this is a better wording, even if it is more verbose! Calilasseia 21:03, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

In the absence of any dissenting voices, I added the above edit. Calilasseia 21:24, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Response
"I have been referring to this article periodically over a time now, but there remains a glaring omission. It is remarkably unclear as to all the nucleotides have been sequenced. What does 'rough draught' mean? I am studying molecular biology and it still makes no sense. Does it mean that it was sequenced, but innacurately? And now that the last chromosome has been sequenced, do we now have every single nucleotide? Please someone expand on this and make it CLEAR!"

was posted earlier here. I would like to explain a little about the process used in the HGP. There are three steps in it. Each level gives a further layer of detail. Only the last sequences the individual nucleotides successfully. The "drafts" have given scientists an idea of the general functions and structures of large segments of the genome. I studied this in my A.P Biology class for crying out loud. I do not know enough to add to the article without reveiwing some old material I read for A.P. Bio on the specifics of the project (would take waaaaaaaaaay to much of my time to find.)


 * Well, that's just sad. You have my sympathy. - User:Samsara (talk • contribs) 23:53, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Clinton's Role in Tech burst Overestimated

 * President Clinton didn't even make an announcement regarding the patenting of genes, I believe it was a communications person (Joe Lockhart). The gene patent issue had been settled by the supreme court long before the announcement. According to

http://www.allbusiness.com/periodicals/article/497481-1.html

"The (stock market) drop was primarily due to a misinterpretation of an announcement by White House spokesman Joe Lockhart, who had indicated earlier that day that President Clinton planned to announce a restriction on genetic patents. CBS News reported that "Presidnt Clinton later today will unveil an agreement with Britain to ban patents on individual genes." CBS later stated that "President Clinton will announce a new agreement with Britain on a statement of principles urging a ban on patents on individual genes."

Following the miscommunication, Clinton soothed many investors by clarifying his comments, saying that genomics companies that discover something with a "specific commercial application ... ought to be able to get a patent on it."

The Crash of tech heavy NASDAQ was due almost entirely to market speculation and panic. You can't blame the tenous nature of the market and the crash that followed on one announcement, although it may have been the beginning. The main cause, I think, is that stocks of the Tech and Biotech industries were highly overvalued which caused the subsequent crash to reality. While it may have been the start of the decline, it is hardly the single cause for the crash Sterichinderance 08:03, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Whose genome?
The "Whose genome...?" section should be wikified rather than a block quote from their FAQ. savidan(talk) (e@) 02:10, 23 June 2006 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kbradnam (talk • contribs) 12:35, 2006 June 23

RCA
I agree with the removal of RCA. I've never heard it mentioned in the context of sequencing the genome. I know that Celera NEVER used it...obviously...large scale shotgun, and if the Nature article doesn't mention it then NIH probably didnt use it. It appears that the DOE did use RCA, however, their role in the H.G.P was rather diminished and in the relative scheme, R.C.A was a rather small scale tool in comparison to the other methods developed by NIH. Sterichinderance 03:42, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Response to Recent Questions
Question 1? - The human genome contains approximately 3 billion nucleotides. Comment 2- The reason I put the Celera stuff in there was that I wanted to put some information regarding how it was done in the article. Previous to that addition on my part, there was nothing. The federal program and Celera did it in a very similar manner except that Celera used shotgun sequencing. I agree that that maybe a separate article should be set up for Celera's efforts, Maybe we could call it "Celera's Contribution to discovery of the Human Genome" If anyone else would comment that would be great. I will add more to the Federally funded HGP methodology soon. Sterichinderance 10:13, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

How WAS it accomplished?
I noticed that in the "How it was accomplished" section, the only discussion was how Celera accomplished their sequencing. This is about the HGP, not Celera, so how did the HGP accomplish their sequencing? (P.S., Why is there so much information about Celera? Shouldn't that be in a different article?) IMacWin95 21:12, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I've just tried to answer some of this. I was involved in both teams, Celera and the HGP, and I am very familiar with all the details of both groups' methods.Genometer 01:55, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I think, and this is waht I have discerned from my APA paper I'm doing on the HGP, that when Celera began to sequence, the HGP upgraded everything on par of what Celera was using.

whose genome?
Just out of curiosity, according to the section on Whose DNA was sequenced, if we tried to create a person using the genome we've sequenced already, what would he/she look like? If anyone knows the answer, that is. Jonathan talk  16:25, 25 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I would hazard a guess that since consensus sequence excludes rare deleterious alleles, the person would be reasonably fit and good-looking (as it has been found that averaged faces are perceived as beautiful), possibly slightly taller than the average of DNA donors, without any particularly remarkable features; he or she would probably have dark hair and somewhat melanised skin, although I'm not sure of the relative numbers of African and Asian vs. Caucasian donors, which would obviously determine whether the consensus sequence had melanised or pale phenotype. It is highly unlikely that any person with the exact consensus sequence will ever exist. - User:Samsara (talk • contribs) 16:42, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Do you think it would be a man or woman? Jonathan  talk [[Image:Canada flag 300.png|30px]] 17:22, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Obviously this depends on what combination of X and Y chromosomes you want to give your little project of cultivation... There's nothing particularly interesting or insightful about turning the HGP data back into a phenotype. 82.92.119.11 17:56, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

The publically funded effort to sequence the human genome used DNA from twelve anonymous volunteers. E.g. see http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/doc_wtx024107.html I think that the privately funded Celera genome sequence was from Craig Venter (the owner of the company).

Almost but not quite correct. Craig was one of five contributors to Celera's genome effort. I added text to explain this one too. Genometer 22:05, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Project end point?
The article says the "rough draft" was completed two years ago, but today's Main Page reports that chromosome #1, the "last chromosome" just had its map completed. What am I missing? It seems that either you have sequenced ALL the DNA or you haven't. Sfahey 16:06, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Two points:


 * 1) The quality of sequence improves with the frequency of coverage, as sequencing is an error-prone process (see e.g. Wesche, Gaffney & Keightley 2005).
 * 2) Sequence is only valuable when it has been annotated - this is the more onerous part of the project and takes longer to complete. Annotation means finding out where all the genes are and what they do. However, the methods for finding genes keep being refined, and you have no absolute criterion for being certain you have actually found all genes. - User:Samsara (talk • contribs) 17:52, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

No, the genome is not complete. I added some text to the "History" section explaining where we are today. Genometer 22:18, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Layout rearrange
I've just rearranged all the content, I found this article as a complete newcomer to be very disorganised... So I've grouped the relevant content for the two competing groups into two sections which should make it easier to read. So now someone new to the subject can read the intro and know stright away what the international group and Celera Genomics are doing. It also allows them to concentrate on a paticular group if they wish. Hope it meets your approval.

Thanks Starry.dreams 20:04, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Benefits
For what's it's worth, I worked in a genetics lab running southern blots. Wikipedia has an excellent page on Southern Blotting. Should this be included under how genetic molecules are "read"...?

Why is sequencing important? (If I am correct) Sequencing is important to understanding protein synthesis. "proteins are essentially polymers made up of a specific sequence of amino acids...a cell reads the genetic information and uses it to construct the protein..." Wikipedia: Protein

Researchers hope to uncover useful information about protein synthesis; what is synthesised normally, verses "abnormally" in people (abnormal synthesis, or lack of normal protein synthesis creats certain genetic disorders.)

Should this be mentioned under the benefit section?

2c me 06:15, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

1.According to my understanding, sequencing is important in order to "discover the structures and functions in living organisms, an important tool for understanding cellular processes." But not only for the information but to later on, develop drugs that will target the problems in a living organism's body faster. 2."Abnormally" in people is describing one that may have a genetic mutation in his/her body/genetic disorder as you mentioned, a missing body part, or disability I would think. "Normally would be considered as a healthy human being. 3.My opinion would be to mention this in protein sequencing but I suppose it is also under benifits.

Please ask me any questions that you have on DNA, cloning, sequencing etc. I am particularly interested in this subject and know about it.

--Starry.dreams 00:34, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Yikes, these are garbled answers. Protein sequencing is completely different from DNA sequencing - Wikipedia has entries on these that should explain. The human genome project was a DNA sequencing project. Genometer 22:08, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the correction Genometer. You can go ahead and just make any correction you think is right. I think you are more clear on this subject than I am. --Starry.dreams 20:06, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Dulbecco
As far as I can find in scientific literature, the first publication on the idea of a Human Genome Project came from Renato Dulbecco: The idea for the HGP came from Renato Dulbecco in 1986 Dulbecco R., A turning point in cancer research: Sequencing the genome, Science, 1986, 231: 1055-56. Pvosta 21:07, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

History
The origin of the idea for a Human Genome Project shows 3 "attempts"Pvosta 21:27, 29 November 2006 (UTC) Renato Dulbecco, A Turning Point in Cancer Research: Sequencing the Human Genome in Viruses and Human Cancer 1 (Alan R. Liss ed. 1987).
 * 1) Robert Sinsheimer, The Santa Cruz Workshop, May 1985, 5 Genomics 954 (1989).
 * 2) Renato Dulbecco, A Turning Point in Cancer Research: Sequencing the Human Genome, 231 Science 1055 (1986)
 * 3) Charles DeLisi, The Human Genome Project, 76 Am. Scientist 488 (1988).

Human Metabolome Project (HMP)
There should be a Human Metabolome Project article. See: Brian Pearson 21:24, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

human genome size and 3rd genome project
Recent addtions to this page (19th Feb 2007) have increased the genome size to 5 billion nucleotides (from 3 billion). This is misleading, there are approximately three billion base pairs in the human genome, and so if you count both nucleotides in each pair, then you could get to a higher figure. I think this should be changed to use the standard scientific terminology. Another change is made to double the length of BAC clones from 150,000 nt to 300,00 (presumably with the same rationale). The same author also mentions a '3rd' human genome project' which is not cited and for which I can not find any information on (from a Google search). Therefore I have doubts as to the validity of other changes by this author and would welcome further feedback from said author to clarify these changes. Nod 17:56, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Who is Kathy York?
I removed the sentence:

Today Francis Collins has been replaced by Kathy York who has the overwhelming task of going through the data collected, along with her team.

because the NHGRI website shows Francis S. Collins is still in charge and I can't find any reference on the web or news to either Kathy York or Cathy York involved in biomedical sciences. (And there is no wikipedia article for Kathy or Cathy York.)

I'm also in doubt about the sentence: The $3-billion project was formally founded in 1990 by the United States Department of Energy, private funding from the York family and the U.S. National Institutes of Health, and was expected to take 15 years

It's hard to do the query "human genome project york family'' without get a ton of false hits. The query (founded 1990 "human genome project" york) doesn't bring up anything about a York family either.

Does anybody know better about the founding of the Human Genome Project?

Clemwang 21:19, 19 February 2007 (UTC)


 * The Kathy York stuff was added at the same point as the 5 billion bp change and the mention of a 3rd genome project (see above). Looks like all of the edits by this person may be questionable and should possibly be removed.
 * Nod 22:53, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

How many chromosomes per cell?
I'm no expert so I've not gone in and edited the following statement from the article, but it seems 'odd' to me as it flies in the face of everything I've ever been taught about chromosomes:

...each male cell contains only one X or one Y chromosome, but not both. (This is true for nearly all male cells not just sperm cells).

...that's from the section "Whose genome was sequenced?"

My understanding was that all male cells had 46 chromosomes (except for sperm).

So am I ill-informed or if not could someone correct that sentence to whatever it should have been? --Mortice 22:36, 21 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Not ill-informed -- Good catch actually. While I was in there, I added some references, and balanced a possibly inadvertent bias of neglecting the IHGSC part of the story.  Thanks, --George Church 02:31, 16 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Cell contains 46 chromosomes i.e., 23 pairs. And the last pair i.e., the 23rd pair contains only one X and one Y chromosome, rest other pairs are autosomes. Therefore, here it is refered to the last pair of chromosomes in male cells. --User:Nitin

President Clinton March 2000 speech cause tech bubble burst?
From this article it implies that Clinton's March 06, 2000 speech caused 50 billion dollars to be pulled out of the biotech stocks overnight. From stock charts this Celera stock crash happened shortly before the NASDAQ crash on March 10, 2000. Speculating, could this be connected thus Clinton unintentionally caused the Dot com bubble to burst? Has any one else looked into this?


 * biotech companies are not related to dot com companies or the dotcom bubble. The article already points out that the speech had an effect on bio-tech companies listed on the NASDAQ. 50 billion dollars was not "pulled out" of biotech stocks. The stocks lost $50bn of value. The reasons for the internet bubble bursting have nothing to do with biotechnology. That's why its called an internet bubble. Bwithh 03:19, 21 May 2006 (UTC)


 * the lawsuit against Microsoft has also been blamed for triggering the dot com crash. The bubble would have burst eventually in any case. DonPMitchell 12:51, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Still, with computers monitoring stock prices and biotech uses lots of computers and instruments, could this have triggered automatic sales of stocks in hi-tech equipment which dragged down others like dominos? The closeness of these stock drops leads one to wonder. If I remember, the SEC has had to shut down the stock market temporarily to prevent trading computers from causing a crash.


 * This would be original research. - User:Samsara (talk • contribs) 18:09, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Miscellaneous comments
Can someone please mention something about James Kent? And how he came in to safe the genome proj See this article....

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.111.86.56 (talk) 03:23, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

. If so, we are only just beginning to understand the full scope of DNA's role in inheritance.

Intro
Isn't the first section supposed to be the intro? Burned thru  00:36, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Hey, this page looks spammed up or changed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.12.62.129 (talk) 22:40, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Added "history" and "how it was accomplished" to the HGP
These are not necessarily in the right order and I pland to add quite a bit more to the acticle as it could use some help. I am far from done but am making this article my summer project Sterichinderance 23:43, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

-- Personally I find both sections quite useful. In the history section however, a casual reading of the first paragraph appears to contradict itself, it appears to say that two different organisms at two different times were both the first to be sequenced? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.95.113.161 (talk) 21:31, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

percent complete is inconsistant
At the end of the 'State of completion' section, its says 92% of the genome has been completed. At the end of the 'Goals' section, 99.99% is quoted. Which is accurate? I realise this is an ongoing project, but I have a hard time believing the second estimate, not to mention that last paragraph needs a serious edit, looks like something i would write :D —Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.253.190.41 (talk) 12:57, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

What does this paragraph mean?
...One minor technical issue is that male samples contain only half as much DNA from the X and Y chromosomes as from the other 22 chromosomes (the autosomes); this happens because each male cell contains only one X and one Y chromosome, not two like other chromosomes (autosomes)....

you are saying that the RP11 samples are used for reasons that are very strange. Do u think the above paragraph is sufficient in supporting the assertion that "the RP11 samples are used"?--147.8.183.224 (talk) 11:12, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

other
removed apparent vandalism 64.219.108.172 04:10, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

There is an instance of vandalism at the beginning of the "International HGP" section. I am unfamiliar with editing Wikipedia, but the instance does not show up on the edit page. It would be appreciated if someone with more experience remedies the situation. Thanks. -unregistered user i was wondering what some of the contoversal issues were generally.209.247.21.237 (talk) 03:58, 29 October 2008 (UTC)E.A.

Merge from ELSI
I have merged the contents of ELSI to this article. ELSI was basically a POV fork based on the opinion of a single critic. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:59, 5 March 2009 (UTC) who is not watching this page)

Costs
Can anyone get us a source on how much NIH, Celera and other organizations spent on this project? Right now, we're looking at new sequencing techniques that dramatically reduce sequencing costs, and people might be interested in a comparison. Darkfrog24 (talk) 12:44, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Goal #2
Goal #2 needs some serious attention. It is a misunderstanding of mitochondrial Eve. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.148.166.54 (talk) 04:17, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

How's that?
It is stated: "All human races are 99.99 % alike" (meaning in genome content). But a few paragraphs higher it is written: "the best estimates of total genome size indicate that about 92.3% of the genome has been completed". These are conflicting numbers, aren't they? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.204.185.130 (talk) 16:56, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Citation from _The Economist_ does not support claim made in article
What http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14742737 actually leads to is a bit from _The Economist_, part of their _ The World in 2010_ project, where the editors asked folks for predictions about what 2010 would bring. It does not summarize papers that have actually been published. Hence, it does not back the specific claim "Significant genetic differences between racial and ethnic groups exist, despite the overall intraspecfic consistency of the genome". SZielins (talk) 06:21, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Interpretations section
Hey all, just edited the interpretations section since three of the four bullet points were either untrue or irrelevant to the HGP. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Atavism (talk • contribs) 04:45, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Criticisms section
Just thought I'd point it out, but the entire 'Criticisms' section is literally copy-pasted from a Op Ed piece from the New York Times. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.150.41.16 (talk) 15:12, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Second "History" second
I just nuked the second "History" section - everything there was covered elsewhere, and it was ill-cited to boot. If I missed something, feel free to revert. Brteag00 (talk) 22:04, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Can anyone please explain
Help me "....It was far too expensive at that time to think of sequencing patients’ whole genomes. So the National Institutes of Health embraced the idea for a "shortcut", which was to look just at sites on the genome where many people have a variant DNA unit. The theory behind the shortcut was that since the major diseases are common, so too would be the genetic variants that caused them......"

How would one come to know of the location of the 'sites' where people may have a variation in their DNA?? — Preceding unsigned comment added by A1dumbiryani (talk • contribs) 13:35, 11 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Hi A1dumbiryani. You've posted this question in the right place to get the attention of someone who might know, the article's talk page (we also have a science reference desk where general science questions are welcome). The helpme request does not call anyone who monitors this page here. Instead it calls random volunteers who monitor the helpme category and would be unlikely to have the specialized knowledge on this topic to answer your question. The helpme template is for asking questions about using Wikipedia. Note also that on Wikipedia you cannot begin a sentence with leading spaces or you get the result you saw when you first posted; I have removed them to make your post readable ( actually I edit conflicted with another user who fixed your post's display first when I attempted to post this response ). You might also read about signing your posts, which was done here by a robot since you did not so so yourself. --Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 14:21, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

"Disease-Causing Genes"
In the second paragraph it is stated "Researchers continue to identify protein-coding genes and their functions; the objective is to find disease-causing genes..." It is widely recognized in the genomics community that genes do not exist to cause disease. Cited: The selfish gene - Richard Dawkins; http://blogs.dnalc.org/2010/02/17/genes-dont-exist-to-cause-disease/ ; http://genetics.thetech.org/about-genetics/mutations-and-disease ; and much much much more. I would suggest changing "causing" to "related" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.89.17.255 (talk) 04:45, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

What was intended by this?
In the section "Findings", one of the bullet items was:

"2. Between 1.1% to 90% of the genes code for proteins"

This statement was earlier:

"2. Between 1.1% to 90% of the genome codes for proteins",

an entirely different statement, and was edited at some time (not sure exactly when). Pseudogenes are not genes, nor is there a simple proportionality between base pairs and genes.

The question is what was originally intended here, and what are the correct up to date figures, with a reference? Elroch (talk) 11:45, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Ethical, Legal and Social Issues
Under the ELSI section, it should be documented from the Human Genome Project website:

DNA studies do not indicate that separate classifiable subspecies (races) exist within modern humans. While different genes for physical traits such as skin and hair color can be identified between individuals, no consistent patterns of genes across the human genome exist to distinguish one race from another. There also is no genetic basis for divisions of human ethnicity.

I am not a geneticist and this statement was a complete surprise to me, and does not seem accurate. I thought that skin pigment and other traits were genetic traits. If you can derive the gene between individuals, why can't they can't they determine those traits through the genome. I don't know if this was an issue of the fed gov profiling by race (violates 4th amendment of the Constitution), or if there is really no genetic data for skin pigment. Are there and genetics experts who might be able to answer that question? NIH published a 144 page document that details that having "race" data leads to problems of identifying minority and discrimination.

By definition, genome is the entirety of an organism's hereditary information. We know that skin pigment is a hereditary, therefore if they cannot distinguish one race from another, the project was a failure. How can DNA be used in a court of law if they don't even know the race? Seem like an important issue.

Also, in this section, there needs to be some mention of

Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) Becomes Law, May 2008.

Mapsurfer49 (talk) 04:38, 26 October 2012 (UTC)

Number of genes in the human genome
The data in the "Findings" section lacks citations and contradicts Genes. Expert needed.

Around 21,000 protein coding genes from Clamp, M. et al. Distinguishing protein-coding and noncoding genes in the human genome. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 104, 19428–19433 (2007).
 * ✅ referenced, as of now does not contradict Genes. --Kubanczyk (talk) 13:01, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Lead Section
''The appropriate length of the lead section depends on the total length of the article. As a general guideline—but not absolute rule—the lead should usually be no longer than four paragraphs.'' --WP:LEAD.

My point - the lead section contains (way) too many paragraphs. We should combine some of them, as some of them are only 1 or 2 sentences and could probably be grouped. Alternately, some of the paragraphs could be omitted from the lead section entirely, but 7 paragraphs is certainly too many. JZCL 11:22, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

epigenetical gets genetical
epigenetical gets genetical!!! --

mostly Histones and a bit less Methylene groups affect the patterns chromosomes divide during gamete meiosis. Epigenetics affect genetics. Clones have variant gene transfering probabilities to their offsprings.

As we know from quantum mechanics and chemistry, different chemical shapes and bonds, have different tolerance.

We can prove that case in the lab with simple bacteria that reproduce sexually.

Changes in epigenetical data, cause changes in probabilistic appearance of DNA sections, therefore genes themselves, some few epigenetic data survive to the embryo.

during meiosis at gametes and then after their merging during fertilization, chromosomes were supposed to lose gradually their epigenetic data, well some data do change, but not all.

It is a probabilistic phenomenon.

we now know that protein chromosomal sleeves not only activate or deactivate probabilistically genes [we do not have the same epigenetics in all our cells] but epigenetical factors exert probabilistic presure at the points DNA twists during meiosis at gametes half DNA gene chart

it is a probabilistic factor though, not the only factor, but a very real one.

That epigenetical "pressure" on genes can be detected with mouse DNA analysis, but we need big samples, because not all changed by histones [rarely also Methyl groups that didn't get deleted] information passes to the next generation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.84.206.251 (talk) 13:22, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

edits today
thanks for updating the article today - I agree that it was (and parts still are) very outdated and I've been meaning to update things. You didn't add citations for the new content. I've added "citations needed" tags per WP:VERIFY; the material will be deleted after a while if no citations are added. Thanks again! Jytdog (talk) 00:03, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I manually reverted this change you made since it contradicted what the source that was already there said. Jytdog (talk) 00:09, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 14:59, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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More Information Needed
The "Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues section is very vague on what the actual issues are, and only actually lists one concern regarding insurance companies.

In the same, "Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues" category, the ELSI forming of the program is discussed, and it is stated that "Five percent of the annual budget was allocated to address the ELSI arising from the project" but doesn't discuss how much money the budget is, or where that money is coming from.

A link to the databases referenced in the "Applications and Proposed Benefits" section should be added to the end of the sentence "The sequence of the DNA is stored in databases available to anyone on the Internet." so that it may be easily accessed. Erinmettler (talk) 21:06, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

general thoughts/concerns
Like stated above the "ethical, legal, and social issues" section seemed almost distracting due to the fact it didn't seem to have any information of what the issues were.

There were are few parts in text where I think a citation was warranted but was not used. for example the last 2 sentences in the "public vs private approach" section used statistics and data but were not cited.

Lastly I think there needs to be information on Pieter J. De Jong either within this article or separately as it was unclear to me was he a gene donor or a man who create libraries for use of within the project.

Doylesmash (talk) 17:45, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

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Rolling circle amplification
Re-entered section on RCAT that was erroniously deleted. RCAT was indeed the method used to amplify DNA for sequencing by the Joint Genome Instutute (please see http://www.jgi.doe.gov/education/how/index.html).


 * The use of the term "amplify" is a misnomer, and was done on purpose to lend unwarranted credibility to this method, which is - at best - questionable. One can not simply "roll in" a repeating sequence and then call it "amplification" - when in fact, all that was done is to extend the initial, partial strand with a duplicate sequence.  It's not a valid sequence.  It's a gap filled in with, quite possibly, nonsense.  This method is dubious to anyone who has ever studied basic biology, or in fact, ever written a line on computer code.  Gibberish is gibberish.  98.194.39.86 (talk) 13:16, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Number of Nucleotides?
OK, I know that there are only 4 possible nucleotides [5 if you count Uracil], but say I give some J. Random Scientist this sequence of nucleotides:

CTAG CTGC CTAA CTCA CGCC CGCA AGAA CACA CCCG.

J. R. Scientist would say that there are 36 nucleotides in this sequence. [Of course, so would almost everyone else...but I digress.] Anywho, my question is this: How many nucleotides are in the entire sequence of the Human Genome?

Every source points to ~3 billion that I ahve ever seen, unless your trying to be a smart-aleck and say it is only four.


 * There are 16 possible combinations of the 4 necleotides. 4 x 4 = 16.  There ya go. 98.194.39.86 (talk) 13:19, 30 October 2018 (UTC)


 * The human genome is said to have three billion base pairs, that is, nucleotide pairs. Everyone has two copies in each cell, one from mom and one from dad, so six billion base pairs. And since they are in pairs, that makes 12 billion nucleotides. The information content is a different question, which you didn't ask about. Gah4 (talk) 23:12, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Generally speaking, advances in genome sequencing technology have followed Moore's Law
The article says Generally speaking, advances in genome sequencing technology have followed Moore's Law making it sound surprising. Most of the advances were lead by the ability to do the computational analysis required. The current (called next-gen) sequencing technology is possible because of the advances in computational ability. So, there is an obvious reason why it follows Moore's law. Gah4 (talk) 23:15, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Way too thin
I agree with the author of "Fortune Teller"; the statement about the HGP "eventually leading to cures for cancer, Alzheimer's disease and other diseases" is pure fluff. There is a significant and meaningful debate...has been for 15 years now...whether the HGP really needed to be done (as a single mega-project, that is). One might as well say (and with equal force) that the invention of the test-tube will eventually lead to a cure for cancer.

I am not sure when the above comment was written, but this debate is over, and was over well before 2020. It is clear that the HGP was an incredible investment, and to get the kind of benefit that arose from it, it needed to be done as a project of some sort. I am not actually sure it was a mega project. But it was at least mid size. Jaredroach (talk) 20:56, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Updates?
Someone has requested updates (March 2022). What information needs to be added? 72.174.131.123 (talk) 14:08, 24 May 2022 (UTC)


 * The request was for addition of the 2022 completion paper reference (as noted in the "with" field in the code for the tag), which was added in various edits over the last several months. I have removed the tag. Jaredroach (talk) 17:43, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Where does the 85 % in 2003 figure above the table of contents come from?
I don't see this number in the reference. In contrast, the reference claims that "In the April 2003 version, there are less than 400 gaps and 99 percent of the genome is finished with an accuracy rate of less than one error every 10,000 base pairs." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Qudent (talk • contribs) 12:49, 24 May 2022 (UTC)


 * I also saw this issue. The same site also claims front and center that the number reported in 2003 was 92%, not 85%. This text was added to the page as a continuation of the sentence that came prior. I dig some digging around and located a transcript of a White House press conference from June of 2000 talking about the progress of the project insofar. Quote:
 * "We have developed a map of overlapping fragments that includes 97 percent of the human genome, and we have sequenced 85 percent of this."
 * I would assume this is where the error came from. Changing the number to reflect this. Larseyfan (talk) 23:22, 3 February 2023 (UTC)