A group of scientists at Hanoi National University has successfully completed the genome of a Vietnamese person, the first of its kind so far, the university reported on Thursday. The group, which is conducting a study entitled “building and analyzing the genome of a Vietnamese person,” received the database related to the genome of a Vietnamese person in late 2013. The database consists of 108 billion nucleotides, said the group, which is led by Dr. Le Sy Vinh, a lecturer at the University of Technology under the Hanoi National University. Based on the database, the group has created a genome of a Vietnamese person by using advanced technologies and calculation methods. The created genome has been compared to the standard human genome; the comparison showed that almost the entire standard genome is covered by the Vietnamese genome, said Dr. Vinh said. Calculations and analyses have been carried out on the computer systems of Technology University, Hanoi University of Science and Technology, and Hanoi National University. The Vietnamese genome has more than 3 million variations of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) compared to the standard human genome. Most of the variations are new and are only found in the Vietnamese genome. The building of the standard human genome was basically completed in 2001 after 15 years, at a total cost of about US$3 billion. This is considered one of the most important scientific breakthroughs of the 21st century. A human genome is the complete set of genetic information for humans. The total length of the human genome is over 3 billion base pairs. The genome is organized into 22 paired chromosomes, the X chromosome (one in males, two in females) and, in males only, one Y chromosome. All chromosomes are large linear deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) molecules contained within the cell nucleus. The building and analyses of the human genome has a great effect on the development of various fields, especially medicine, pharmaceutics, biological technologies, and anthropology, and also contributes to boosting economic growth, experts said. Currently, about 20 nations have successfully built and analyzed their own genomes.