Personal Reflections on Craig Venter: Expressed Sequence Tags

Venter's big Expressed Sequence Tag - soon known as ESTs - paper came out in June during my final summer as an intern; I photocopied it at my internship. I looked it up, and it had only a bit over 600 sequences - a small beginning to what would become an industry-wide exercise. That was a momentous time for me, as only the past December had I pivoted from thinking I would get a degree in…