MPSC 2025 Prelims Paper-I · Question 63 of 100

Correct — option (3), Only a. The Human Genome Project (HGP), a 13-year international effort formally launched in October 1990 and completed in 2003, stated its own goals at the outset, and only statement a among the four given here reproduces one of them accurately. Statement a — to identify 20,000 to 25,000 genes in human DNA — is exactly the project's headline goal. Before the project, textbook estimates of human gene count ran as high as 80,000-100,000; the HGP's own sequencing and annotation work revised this down sharply, and by the early-to-mid 2000s the consensus settled at roughly 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes, which is the figure the project is remembered for. That single, verifiable claim is why statement a survives. Statement b fails on its number, not its idea: the HGP did aim to sequence the complete set of base pairs in human DNA, but the actual figure is about 3 billion base pairs, not 5 billion — a factual substitution that breaks the statement even though the underlying goal (sequencing the genome) is real. Statement c, incorporating new genomic knowledge into research and medicine, describes a genuine downstream consequence of the project — the genomics and precision-medicine era it enabled — but it is not one of the goals the HGP itself formally listed (which were: identify all human genes; sequence the 3 billion base pairs; store the data in databases; improve data-analysis tools; transfer the resulting technology to the private sector; and address the ethical, legal and social implications, or ELSI, of the work). Because MPSC is testing the project's own stated objectives rather than its eventual real-world impact, statement c is excluded here. Statement d, developing animal cloning, was never an HGP objective at all — cloning (as in the 1996 birth of Dolly the sheep via somatic cell nuclear transfer) is an unrelated reproductive-biology technique, not a genome-sequencing one. With b, c and d each eliminated for a distinct reason, statement a stands alone, matching option (3).

• (1)Only b and d — This set keeps exactly the two statements that fail: b is undone by its own numbers (the human genome is about 3 billion base pairs, not the 5 billion the statement claims), and d attributes an objective — animal cloning — that the Human Genome Project never held. Cloning and genome sequencing are different lines of biotechnology entirely; the HGP mapped and read the genome, it did not attempt to replicate organisms. Selecting this pair also leaves out statement a, the one claim in the question that is factually accurate and central to what the project is best known for.
• (2)Only a and c — This pairs the one demonstrably correct statement, a, with c, which is not wrong in spirit — genomic knowledge genuinely has been incorporated into research and medicine since the HGP — but is not one of the project's own formally stated objectives (identifying genes, sequencing base pairs, building databases, improving analysis tools, technology transfer, and addressing ethical/legal/social implications). Treating a general, true-sounding outcome as an original 'objective' is the exact trap this option sets: it rewards recognising a plausible sentence rather than the project's own documented goal list.
• (4)Only b — This isolates the statement with the wrong number. The Human Genome Project's sequencing target was the roughly 3 billion base pairs of human DNA, not 5 billion; the idea behind statement b (that the project aimed to sequence the full genome) is genuine, but the specific figure given is not, which is enough to disqualify it on a question built around precise, checkable objectives. Choosing this option also omits statement a, the one objective stated with an accurate number.

The Human Genome Project was the international effort, coordinated by the US Department of Energy and National Institutes of Health together with international partners, to produce a complete map and sequence of all the DNA in the human genome. It formally began in October 1990 and was declared complete in April 2003. Its own stated goals, as published by the coordinating agencies, were sixfold: identify all the genes in human DNA, estimated at the time to number 20,000 to 25,000; determine the sequence of the roughly 3 billion chemical base pairs that make up human DNA; store this information in accessible databases; improve tools for data analysis; transfer related technologies to the private sector; and address the ethical, legal and social issues (ELSI) that the project's findings might raise. Sequencing effort also extended to model organisms — the mouse, the fruit fly and others — useful for comparative genomics. The project's central technical achievement was reducing the number of estimated human genes far below the six-figure counts once assumed, since a very large majority of the genome does not code for protein.

MPSC uses this kind of question to check whether a candidate has actually read the Human Genome Project's stated aims rather than absorbing only the popular-science version of the story — 'we mapped the human genome' — that circulates outside the classroom. The four statements are constructed to test three distinct failure modes at once: a subtly wrong number (5 billion instead of 3 billion base pairs), a true-sounding but non-canonical objective (research and medicine applications, which are a consequence rather than a listed goal), and an entirely unrelated technology (cloning) dressed up as if it belonged to the same project. A candidate who has only a vague sense of 'genome project = genes and DNA' is likely to accept several of these; only close familiarity with the project's own six goals isolates statement a as the one that survives unmodified.

• The Human Genome Project ran from October 1990 to April 2003, an international 13-year effort.
• It identified roughly 20,000 to 25,000 protein-coding genes in human DNA, far fewer than pre-project estimates.
• It sequenced approximately 3 billion base pairs of human DNA, not 5 billion.
• Its formally stated goals also included building databases, improving analysis tools, technology transfer to industry, and addressing ethical, legal and social implications (ELSI).
• Animal cloning (e.g., Dolly the sheep, 1996) is an unrelated reproductive-biology technology, not an HGP objective.

• Accepting a true-sounding downstream benefit of a project (like 'applications in medicine') as if it were one of the project's own stated objectives
• Missing a swapped number inside an otherwise accurate-sounding statement, such as 5 billion in place of 3 billion base pairs
• Conflating genome sequencing with unrelated biotechnologies such as cloning simply because both fall under 'genetics'
• Assuming every statement built around real scientific vocabulary must itself be a real, sourced claim

MPSC's biology/biotechnology questions on landmark scientific projects like the Human Genome Project typically list several statements, only some genuine, mixing accurate objectives with numerically altered or entirely unrelated claims, and ask which subset is correct — rewarding candidates who know the project's own documented goals rather than its general reputation.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Approximately how many base pairs of human DNA did the Human Genome Project set out to sequence ?

  • (a)1 billion
  • (b)3 billion
  • (c)5 billion
  • (d)10 billion

  Answer(b) 3 billion — the Human Genome Project's sequencing target was the roughly 3 billion chemical base pairs that make up human DNA.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which of the following was NOT one of the Human Genome Project's own stated goals ?

  • (a)Identifying all genes in human DNA
  • (b)Improving tools for data analysis
  • (c)Developing cloning techniques for animals
  • (d)Addressing ethical, legal and social implications (ELSI) of genomic research

  Answer(c) Developing cloning techniques for animals — cloning is an unrelated reproductive-biology technology and was never among the Human Genome Project's stated objectives, unlike gene identification, analysis-tool development, and the ELSI program, all of which were.