I went to a talk of his once and discovered that I also have aphantasia. Seemed like a genuinely nice guy the little I interacted with him. RIP
Craig Venter has died
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Re: Craig Venter has died
#12[deleted]
Re: Craig Venter has died
#13Craig Venter was famously involved in the Human Genome Project. He announced the first draft of the human genome alongside President Clinton and Francis Collins.
i believe he also was the human genome project, he arranged to have one of the samples be him
Craig Venter had his genome sequenced in 2007. It was the first individual human genome that was sequenced and released publicly.
The human reference genome is ~70% from a man with African and European ancestry who lived somewhere around Buffalo, NY. Most of the rest is from ~20 other individuals in the same area. They were supposed to sequence the samples more evenly, but apparently there were some technical reasons that made them prioritize a single sample.
Re: Craig Venter has died
#14Craig Venter was famously involved in the Human Genome Project. He announced the first draft of the human genome alongside President Clinton and Francis Collins.
i believe he also was the human genome project, he arranged to have one of the samples be him
Yes, his was the first complete genome ever sequenced (by a private entity).
Re: Craig Venter has died
#15That's unexpected. He was only 80, and as I understand it still working.
My his memory be a blessing.
Re: Craig Venter has died
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
i believe he also was the human genome project, he arranged to have one of the samples be him
Yes, his was the first complete genome ever sequenced (by a private entity).
This reminds me of the interesting fact that
> Linnaeus is designated as the type specimen for the human species, Homo sapiens.
Re: Craig Venter has died
#17Craig Venter was famously involved in the Human Genome Project. He announced the first draft of the human genome alongside President Clinton and Francis Collins.
i believe he also was the human genome project, he arranged to have one of the samples be him
You are confused by the human genome project vs the celera genome project. No, the human genome project didn't include his sample.
Re: Craig Venter has died
#18Sad news. I met Craig very briefly at a conference probably a decade back. I pretty much was a self-study in genetics at the time... so let's just say I wasn't in Craig's league. Despite this he was very engaged and took the time for a very thoughtful chat.
Re: Craig Venter has died
#19RIP Craig Venter.
I remember being in 5th grade and hearing about the Human Genome Project. It was presented as a radical undertaking. 30 years later, look how far we've come. Just the other day I was reading about the UK Biobank leaks (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47875843), and it was mentioned that some large number of complete human genomes were leaking out. And I thought wow, back in the day people thought Craig Venter was out there.
Thank you Craig Venter!
Re: Craig Venter has died
#20Somewhat ironically, he'd spent the last years of his life working on prolonging life [1], and was selling a $25,000 "proactive healthcare service" consultation to anyone who could afford it [2].
1: The company's website, humanlongevity dot com, seems to have been compromised, and as "captcha" will try to have you install a Trojan. So here's the Wikipedia page instead: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Longevity
2: https://fortune.com/2017/02/21/craig-venter-human-longevity/