Latest progress on the chicken genome project

The publication of draft sequence of the chicken genome in early 2004 marks expressly the start of functional genomics of poultry. Chicken is not only a widely raised economic farm animal, but also a valuable model organism for the study of life sciences. The draft sequence of the chicken genome has significant impact on both animal breeding and basic biological research. The current progress of the chicken genome research is reviewed in this paper, which includes data from the chicken genome, its physical map, genetic linkage map and comparative genome map, as well as expressed sequence tags and bioinformatics. Potential applications of chicken genome research are also envisaged.