A Part of the Human Genome Sequence

摘要

The sequencing and subsequent publication of the human genome captured the public imagination and marked the beginning of a new era in biological research. An unfortunate side effect of human genome sequencing has been the inappropriate elevation of the genome to almost mythical status as the seat of our humanness. The published genome is a collection of human DNA sequences, nothing more and nothing less. By acknowledging that my own DNA sample was part of the Celera Genomics sequencing effort, I hoped to dispel the notion that there is any such thing as a single human genome and to show that genome sequencing is neither harmful nor magical.