Nov 5, 2014 - News

The Traveling Genome

Last year, on the sixtieth anniversary of Crick and Watson’s discovery of the double helix structure of DNA, the Smithsonian opened an exhibit at the unlocking the code logoNational Museum of Natural History called Genome: Unlocking Life’s Code.

The popular exhibit is now hitting the road, showing first in San Diego, at the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center through January 4th 2015 and then moving on to other cities across the United States and Canada for the next four years.

The exhibit has already attracted more than three million people with its use of interactive technology and more traditional methods of storytelling to educate people about how genetic science is transforming everything from medicine to our understanding of human evolution.

“Over the past year, I have enjoyed speaking with children and adults from far and wide at the exhibition, and during the educational workshops, public lectures and celebrations in Washington,” said Eric D. Green, the director of the National Human Genome Research Institute. “Now it is time for the Unlocking Life's Code
exhibition to travel so that others in North America can see it.”

Officials from the National Human Genome Research Institute, which is part of the Health and Human Services agency, worked with curators from the Smithsonian to put together the exhibit. They were helped by contributions from others, including private businesses like 23andMe. The exhibit traces the rapid advancement in the science of genetics, exploring how those discoveries have contributed to our understanding of the causes and treatment of disease as well as more insight into the human story and how our ancestors migrated out of Africa and populated the world.

After its stint in San Diego, the exhibit will travel to San Jose; St Louis; Portland; Milwaukee; Wichita; Peoria; and Sudbury, Ontario.

To see if the traveling exhibit is coming your way see the schedule here.

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