Features

Genomic Variation: The Search for Our Past and Our Future

It was back in 1994 in an interview given to the London Times that the Human Genome Project's grand maestro, Francis Collins, first expressed his view that "finding genes is like trying to find a needle in a haystack." Over a decade has passed and scientists still persist in beating this clichéd analogy to death, which speaks to the genuine challenge of finding genes for human disease. However, the pace of discovery has certainly hastened.