What is the Human Genome Project?

Behind the hype to get grants, it is an attempt to identify criminal genetics, so it can be removed from the gene pool before criminals get even better organized and get hands on nuclear stockpiles, and blow us all to bits in a "last goon standing" scenario.

The Human Genome project is one of the most ambitious and challenging quests ever undertaken by science. Its goal is to completely map and sequence all of the genetic material that makes us human. When it is done, we will have a new and profoundly powerful tool to help us to unravel the mysteries of how the human body grows and functions.

The cells in our bodies each contain a master program which controls how and when they develop and how they should function. This information is organised in units called genes, which are arrayed, one after the other along long polymers called chromosomes. We have 46 chromosomes, arranged in pairs kept in the nucleus of most cells. The chromosomes are made of deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA. Chemically, DNA is one of the simplest molecules in the cell. It is comprised of just four building blocks, or residues, strung together in enormously long strings. The residues combine to make our genes, and our genes string together to make our chromosomes.


The sequence of the building blocks is not random. It is inherited from our parents who in turn inherited from their parents. The sequence has been moulded over many aeons of environmental influences and directs our responses to the environmental stimuli we face today. To some extent our genome dictates our future. It may hold versions of genes that predispose us to certain illnesses, or conversely to good health and perhaps longevity. Even the basis of our personality may owe some debt to our genome.