With third generation sequencing, sequencing a genome has become a cheaper, faster and more sophisticated process. 

The Sanger sequencing method, developed in 1977, enabled scientists to read the genetic code for the first time. It is based on the natural process of DNA replication.

The Human Genome Project, which began officially in 1990, was the largest international collaboration ever undertaken in biology and involved thousands of scientists. 

By the mid-1990s, when the Human Genome Project was in full swing, scientists were sequencing DNA using capillary sequencers.