To compare, a fruit fly has 13,000 genes. Most scientists had believed there were at least 60,000 or so, and one biotech firm had an estimate as high as 140,000. We may have picked up these traits via bacterial infection. Inherited genetic mutations arise about twice as often in men than women, a finding that confirms a recent study. Only 1 percent to 1.5 percent of the human DNA carries instructions for making proteins, compared to the 3 percent to 5 percent the researchers expected.
Genes tell cells how to make proteins, which are crucial for each cell's structure and functioning.
Along the stretches of DNA, genes tend to occur in clusters, like cities separated by vast stretches of countryside. The Cincinnati Enquirer , a Gannett Co. Inc. newspaper.