In 2001, The February 16 issue of Science and February 15 issue of Nature contain the working draft of the human genome sequence (U.S. Human Genome Project).

The draft sequence covered more than 90 percent of the human genome. One surprise was that the estimated number of genes was lower than expected, just 30,000-35,000. The final genome sequence produced in 2003 has further lowered this estimate to the 20,000-25,000 range. The sequence data was immediately and freely released to the world.

The U.S. Human Genome Project, established in 1990, was completed in 2003 — a 13-year effort coordinated by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health. The project was originally planned to last 15 years.