A special report on the human genome: Inhuman genomes | The Economist

A special report on the human genome: Inhuman genomes | The Economist: "The Frankencell project, as it was known jokingly at the beginning, had been going for 15 years—ever since Dr Venter started to wonder what was the minimal genome necessary to support a living organism. To find out, he took a bacterium called Micoplasma genitalium, which has a particularly short genome anyway, and knocked its genes out one at a time to see which the bug could live without (at least in the cushy circumstances of a laboratory Petri dish). The answer was around 100 of its original complement of 485."