Scientists have decoded the entire human genome. The human genome is responsible for our making.
Advances in genomic sequencing technology could drive a renaissance of medical breakthroughs, researchers say.
For the very first time in 2003, it was announced that the human genome has been sequenced and assembled but there were a few minor gaps, which lead to 92 per cent of the genome identification, leaving the important heterochromatic regions unfinished.
With powerful new sequencing technology, a collaboration of about 100 scientists announced on Thursday that they have filled in the gaps, completing a single human genome from one end to the other and opening new, promising lines of research in areas of genetic diversities. The new accomplishment will open the doors to new methods to enhance human health.
In the fields of molecular biology and genetics, a genome is all the genetic information of an organism. It consists of nucleotide sequences of DNA. The genome includes both the genes and the noncoding DNA, as well as mitochondrial DNA and chloroplast DNA. The study of the genome is called genomics.
According National Human Genome Institute-
‘With its four-letter language, DNA contains the information needed to build the entire human body. A gene traditionally refers to the unit of DNA that carries the instructions for making a specific protein or set of proteins. Each of the estimated 20,000 to 25,000 genes in the human genome codes for an average of three proteins.’
‘The Human Genome Project, which was led at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) by the National Human Genome Research Institute, produced a very high-quality version of the human genome sequence that is freely available in public databases. That international project was successfully completed in April 2003, under budget and more than two years ahead of schedule’.
‘The Human Genome Project was designed to generate a resource that could be used for a broad range of biomedical studies. One such use is to look for the genetic variations that increase the risk of specific diseases, such as cancer, or to look for the type of genetic mutations frequently seen in cancerous cells. More research can then be done to fully understand how the genome functions and to discover the genetic basis for health and disease’.
