A Short Guide to the Human Genome

Author: Stewart Scherer

Publisher: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press

Read: (yes | maybe | no)

“A Short Guide to the Human Genome” (or SGHG) is a book by scientists, for scientists. It’s not for laypeople, and while condensed, it’s an advanced text best read by molecular biologists comfortable reading scientific papers about genomics. For this, SGHG is a “maybe” read.

But, as a useful book for scientists, SGHG is quite good. Laudably, its stated purpose is to present facts to flesh academic work. With its simple question-to-answer format and well-summarized tables and graphs, it does so well —without sacrificing scientific thoroughness. However, don’t expect any explanations, editorial insights, or appeals to the “bigger picture.” Which Genes Have the Most Exons? Scherer states the facts: TTN has the most exons. It has 312 exons. You are expected to provide your own context.

This book is for you if:

• You need to pepper your powerpoint presentation with “relevant interesting facts” about the genome. In fact, if you teach a university lecture about genetics or molecular biology, BUY THIS BOOK. You will not regret it, and your lectures will be better for it.
• You have or may ever write a scientific paper with a string of “ATCG” anywhere in the text.
• You are a huge nerd for factiods, and hey, you read all those journals anyways…

This book is NOT for you if:

• You find Nature Genetics to be unintelligible.
• You find Nature Genetics to be uninteresting.
• You’re James Watson.

I eagerly anticipate the contents of this book to appear on Wikipedia.

Fun Genome Facts!

(see? You can’t resist peppering your work with these snackable factiods. Just think how easy this could make your work when you need some plug-and-play ideas?)

• The blood type of reference human genome is “O” (pg. 135)
• A mouse has 19 autosomes, plus the XY sex chromosomes. While similar, its genome is about 10% smaller than a human’s. (pg. 146)
• The Y chromosome is by far the least sequenced chromosome, with only 44.4% sequenced (as of release 36.2). This is because the Y chromosome contains large blocks of repeated sequences, and the “shotgun” approach to used to sequence the reference human genome does not resolve repeated sequences accurately. (pg. 6)
• How big is the largest protein? 33,423 amino acids (titin, which is encoded by the TTN gene). The smallest? 25aa (product of gene RPL41). The smallest predicted? 13aa (LOC644929 and LOC727721). (pg. 68)