The human genome holds an extraordinary trove of information about human development, physiology, medicine and evolution. Here we report the results of an international collaboration to produce and make freely available a draft sequence of the human genome. We also present an initial analysis of the data, describing some of the insights that can be gleaned from the sequence.

Here we report a high-quality draft genome sequence of the domestic dog (Canis familiaris), together with a dense map of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) across breeds. The dog is of particular interest because it provides important evolutionary information and because existing breeds show great phenotypic diversity for morphological, physiological and behavioural traits. We use sequence comparison with the primate and rodent lineages to shed light on the structure and evolution of genomes and genes. Notably, the majority of the most highly conserved non-coding sequences in mammalian genomes are clustered near a small subset of genes with important roles in development. Analysis of SNPs reveals long-range haplotypes across the entire dog genome, and defines the nature of genetic diversity within and across breeds. The current SNP map now makes it possible for genome-wide association studies to identify genes responsible for diseases and traits, with important consequences for human and companion animal health.

The sequence of the mouse genome is a key informational tool for understanding the contents of the human genome and a key experimental tool for biomedical research. Here, we report the results of an international collaboration to produce a high-quality draft sequence of the mouse genome. We also present an initial comparative analysis of the mouse and human genomes, describing some of the insights that can be gleaned from the two sequences. We discuss topics including the analysis of the evolutionary forces shaping the size, structure and sequence of the genomes; the conservation of large-scale synteny across most of the genomes; the much lower extent of sequence orthology covering less than half of the genomes; the proportions of the genomes under selection; the number of protein-coding genes; the expansion of gene families related to reproduction and immunity; the evolution of proteins; and the identification of intraspecies polymorphism.

Tetraodon nigroviridis is a freshwater puffer fish with the smallest known vertebrate genome. Here, we report a draft genome sequence with long-range linkage and substantial anchoring to the 21 Tetraodon chromosomes. Genome analysis provides a greatly improved fish gene catalogue, including identifying key genes previously thought to be absent in fish. Comparison with other vertebrates and a urochordate indicates that fish proteins have diverged markedly faster than their mammalian homologues. Comparison with the human genome suggests ,900 previously unannotated human genes. Analysis of the Tetraodon and human genomes shows that whole-genome duplication occurred in the teleost fish lineage, subsequent to its divergence from mammals. The analysis also makes it possible to infer the basic structure of the ancestral bony vertebrate genome, which was composed of 12 chromosomes, and to reconstruct much of the evolutionary history of ancient and recent chromosome rearrangements leading to the modern human karyotype.Access to entire genome sequences is revolutionizing our understanding of how genetic information is stored and organized in DNA, and how it has evolved over time. The sequence of a genome provides exquisite detail of the gene catalogue within a species, and the recent analysis of near-complete genome sequences of three mammals (human 1 , mouse 2 and rat 3 ) shows the acceleration in the search for causal links between genotype and phenotype, which can then be related to physiological, ecological and evolutionary observations. The partial sequence of the compact puffer fish Takifugu rubripes genome was obtained recently and this survey provided a preliminary catalogue of fish genes 4 . However, the Takifugu assembly is highly fragmented and as a result important questions could not be addressed.Here, we describe and analyse the genome sequence of the freshwater puffer fish Tetraodon nigroviridis with long-range linkage and extensive anchoring to chromosomes. Tetraodon resembles Takifugu in that it possesses one of the smallest known vertebrate genomes, but as a popular aquarium fish it is readily available and is easily maintained in tap water (see Supplementary Notes for naming conventions, natural habitat and phylogeny). The two puffer fish diverged from a common ancestor between 18-30 million years (Myr) ago and from the common ancestor with mammals about 450 Myr ago 5 . This long evolutionary distance provides a good contrast to distinguish conserved features from neutrally evolving DNA by sequence comparison. Tetraodon sequences in fact had an important role in providing a reliable estimate of the number of genes in the human genome 6 . There has been a vigorous and unresolved debate as to whether a whole-genome duplication (WGD) occurred in the ray-finned fish (actinopterygians) lineage after its separation from tetrapods [7][8][9] . By exploiting the extensive anchoring of the Tetraodon sequence to chromosomes, we provide a definitive answer to this question. The distribution of duplicated genes in t...

Neurospora crassa is a central organism in the history of twentieth-century genetics, biochemistry and molecular biology. Here, we report a high-quality draft sequence of the N. crassa genome. The approximately 40-megabase genome encodes about 10,000 protein-coding genes-more than twice as many as in the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe and only about 25% fewer than in the fruitfly Drosophila melanogaster. Analysis of the gene set yields insights into unexpected aspects of Neurospora biology including the identification of genes potentially associated with red light photobiology, genes implicated in secondary metabolism, and important differences in Ca(2+) signalling as compared with plants and animals. Neurospora possesses the widest array of genome defence mechanisms known for any eukaryotic organism, including a process unique to fungi called repeat-induced point mutation (RIP). Genome analysis suggests that RIP has had a profound impact on genome evolution, greatly slowing the creation of new genes through genomic duplication and resulting in a genome with an unusually low proportion of closely related genes