"Paleogenomics": Looking in the past to the future

The complete sequence of the human and other vertebrate and nonvertebrate g enomes provide a wealth of information on the organization, relationships a nd evolution of the metazoans. Soon the fine structure of our innermost bio logical identity will be unveiled and what has so far remained deep and sec ret will shine like an unearthed treasure and shape and fuel our future que sts. A key treasure, for many molecular scientists interested in molecular evolution and development would be the knowledge of the genome of the ances tral precursor of all metazoans. In the absence of fossil DNA, this knowled ge will forever remain a yearning for dreamy molecular biologists. And yet, will not the power of deduction and reconstitution of information gained t hrough man's sophisticated technologies one day recreate a "virtual" metazo an ancestor? (C) 2000 Wiley-Liss, Inc.