Chapter Three
The Meaning of the Life Script
Though the two sides' claim to have sequenced the human genome sparked headlines
around the world, they were celebrating victory before the battle. Each team now
had to interpret its genome sequence by describing its major features and
locating the genes, and from the quality of the respective reports a clear
winner could emerge in the eyes of their fellow scientists.
This first analysis of the human genome was just as much a landmark in
scientific history as the years spent decoding the sequence. But it was
compressed into a few months' whirlwind of activity as the two sides set about
interpreting the strange and enigmatic script they had wrested from the human
cell. Talk of a joint annotation conference at which the two sides would compare
notes in interpreting the human genome soon evaporated. Celera and the
consortium worked with different groups of experts and published ...
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