‘Huge advances in cancer and rare diseases’: 25 years of the human genome

Science Weekly

The Guardian

Science

4.2 • 938 Ratings

🗓️ 26 June 2025

⏱️ 21 minutes

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Summary

It has been 25 years since Bill Clinton announced one of humanity’s most important scientific achievements: the first draft of the human genome. At the time, there was a great deal of excitement about the benefits that this new knowledge would bring, with predictions about curing genetic diseases and even cancer. To find out which of them came to pass, and what could be in store over the next two-and-a-half decades, Madeleine Finlay is joined by science editor Ian Sample, and hears from Prof Matthew Hurles, director of the Wellcome Sanger Institute. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/sciencepod

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0:25.3	Witness Asia through the eyes of local and international artists in Singapore.
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0:37.9	forward slash travel Southeast Asia.
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1:23.8	Twenty-five years ago, scientists announced a major breakthrough.
1:28.3	We are here to celebrate the completion of the first survey of the entire human genome.
1:33.3	A milestone for human knowledge.
1:36.3	More than a thousand researchers across six nations have revealed nearly all three billion letters of our miraculous genetic code. With the human genome at our fingertips for the first time,
1:48.0	there were plenty of exciting predictions of what lay ahead for science and healthcare.
	...

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