The public consortium is making its data public, believing that medical and scientific progress depend on open access to the sequence.

Dr. Watson laid out the elements of what has been the public consortium's strategy ever since.

The public consortium's genome is drawn from a mosaic of different individuals.

Biologists who wish to know every letter in the human genetic code will almost certainly have to rely on the public consortium to obtain this.

He first offered it to the public consortium but was told it would not work.

So far the public consortium has an impressive record of meeting its major goals on schedule and within budget.

So far Celera has ordered 300 machines and the public consortium 200.

This restriction seems designed to prevent the public consortium from using Celera's human genome sequence to help complete its own.

The first human genome decoding, completed by a public consortium of universities in 2003, cost more than $500 million.

Besides this success, Celera has the advantage of being able to see the public consortium's data while not having to show its own.