What international scientific megaprojects do Russian researchers participate in?

In 1990, the US government initiated the international Human Genome Project, the goal of which was to determine all base pairs of human DNA. Key work was carried out in research centers in the USA, Great Britain, France, Germany, Japan and China, although scientists from other countries, including Russians, also took part in them. By 2003, they had deciphered 92% of the genome, announcing the end of the project. The complete DNA sequence was revealed in 2022.

In 2010, on the initiative of Russia, the USA, Korea, Sweden, Canada and Iran, an even more large-scale and labor-intensive project was launched – the “Human Proteome”, which is intended to carry out an “inventory” of all proteins encoded in the genome. Russian scientists are engaged in the determination of the proteome of the 18th chromosome. At the moment, more than 20 countries are participating in the project, it is 93% completed.

The data obtained open up new opportunities in medical diagnosis and treatment of diseases. Russia did not participate in the “Human Genome” at the state level, but in the “Proteome”, one of the initiators of which was the V. N. Orekhovich Institute of Biomedical Chemistry, domestic teams occupy leading positions.