text: I'm glad a scientist weighed in here because this is what I expected from the scientific establishment.  I will ignore the condescending tone for now.  First sequencing the human genome is not very basic research.  It is not even basic research.  It is applied research.  More importantly, what we understood of DNA and what it does has not been impacted by the sequencing project.  In other words, DNA sequencing is a natural outgrowth of a theoretical basis established in the 50s.  The technology to sequence DNA would have been wild speculation 40 years ago, but not the vision and theoretical potential of doing so.  I must disagree with Ms. Washington on the discoveries of new planets.  First, they are discoveries not theoretical breakthroughs.  Secondly, in most cases, they were found first, theory followed.  Much of what we believe to be theoretical advance today is really just very sophisticated discovery, not advance in understanding.  Such as the discovery of gravity waves.