Explore the decades-long journey to map the full human genome, from early breakthroughs to the first complete, gapless DNA sequence.

Utz is a science communicator, public historian, and archivist, formerly at the National Human Genome Research Institute. I’d be willing to bet that most of the U.S. population above the age of 35 has at least heard of the Human Genome Project.

A team of UK-based researchers is going where no scientist has dared to go—writing artificial human DNA from scratch. They’re hoping the project will answer fundamental questions about the human genome and transform our understanding of health and disease.

J. Craig Venter, PhD, left, President Bill Clinton, and Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD, The White House, June 26, 2000. [Mark Wilson/Newsmakers/Getty Images] The announcement of the first draft of the human genome 25 years ago was a pivotal moment that ...