Daily Briefing: ‘A true pioneer and maverick’, Craig Venter dead at 79

You have full access to this article via your institution. Hello Nature readers, would you like to get this Briefing in your inbox free every day? Sign up here . Craig Venter in his office with his dog, Darwin. Credit: Eli Meir Kaplan/For The Washington Post via Getty Craig Venter — who led a race to decode the human genome, pioneered a genome-sequencing method still used today, created the first organisms with synthetic genomes and sailed around the world recording microbial diversity — died yesterday, aged 79. Venter is most well-known for leading a commercial effort to generate the first human genome sequence in the 1990s, racing against the US$3 billion global, publicly funded Human Genome Project. But Venter’s scientific legacy extended well beyond the ‘genome wars’ , say scientists who knew, admired and competed with him. “He is a true pioneer and maverick who revolutionized genomics by enabling new sequencing methods and trying to create synthetic cells,” says Tae Seok Moon, a synthetic biologist at Venter’s research centre. “It's a huge loss for all genomics and synthetic biology researchers.” Nature | 7 min read