Eleven years ago the Human Genome Project was finished and celebrated. After all, it was bringing the hope of cure for serious diseases, such as cancer, and surely new knowledge for scientists. However, passed the genome decade, perhaps a sense of frustration is felt once the cure of cancer was not reached, few questions get answers and a billion of new questions emerged from this “Pandora Box” named Human Genome. But what is left of this odyssey? As in any good story, good lessons. The first lesson the scientists ever knew, the human genome is not only a sequence of nucleotide randomly organized but part of a microenvironment where DNA, RNA and proteins work in a complex and sophisticated pathway. The second lesson had also just been learned with the project of Human Genome: complex issues require efforts together to be solved. The third lesson was a conclusion from the first and second lessons: a new project integrating efforts of scientists of worldwide will be needed to answer the open questions which led to the introduction of the ENCODE project (Encyclopedia Of DNA Elements).

Citation: de Souza Pardo AP (2012) The Odyssey of Encode. Human Genet Embryol 2:e107. doi: 10.4172/2161-0436.1000e107

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