The international goal is sequence the entire genome by 2003. I remember people saying that the genome program is very similar to the Apollo program. It's like going to the moon and that has some great analogy to it. It's a huge program - it's the biggest thing biologists have ever seen, maybe will ever see in terms of a coordinated program. What is next, after sequencing the mouse genome, is understanding all the proteins.
Genes make proteins.
Really understanding biology and understanding exactly what happens within disease states, it means that you really want to understand proteins. For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin. This is Science Today. Selenium is a trace mineral with a controversial history. In the early Eighties, highly toxic levels of selenium drained into a California reservoir killing wild birds.