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Great minds: Mapping genomes

Two men with very different approaches have been instrumental in the Human Genome Project.

By Victoria Stagg Elliott, amednews staff. May 21, 2001.

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Mapping Disease
As the results of the Human Genome Project began to shake out into clinical applications, this 2001-02 series detailed progress in the prevention and treatment of a variety of diseases and conditions -- both on the near horizon and possibilities far into the future.

Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, and J. Craig Venter, PhD, president of Celera Genomics, are two men aiming for the same target: the decoding of the human genome. Their means, styles, philosophies and uses for the completed project, however, are very different.

The government's Human Genome Project started in 1990 as a joint effort between the Dept. of Energy and the National Institutes of Health. Originally a 15-year initiative, it has accelerated significantly over the years with the advent of new technology and a competitor in the private sector -- Celera Genomics. Dr. Venter, a former NIH researcher, founded Celera in 1998 to utilize his method of "shotgun sequencing" to complete the work in less than a year. Despite months of public acrimony, last summer, the two former colleagues announced jointly that they had completed sequencing the 3.1 billion base pairs of the human genome.

Dr. Collins, the gentleman scholar who has directed the federal effort since 1992, is a deeply religious man. His office on the NIH campus is decorated with the covers of medical journals such as Nature Genetics and JAMA. It reflects a hybrid style of academe and government issue.

Celera Genomics, farther out on the fringes of the Washington, D.C., suburbs, has the same medical journals decorating its offices, but also Forbes and Business Week. There are visible signs warning against the use of recording devices on the premises and high security doors blocking entry beyond the lobby. Behind those doors are large labs with more computers than people. It is in this high-tech labyrinth that Dr. Venter, the businessman and maverick of genetic science, goes to work. [...]