The NHGRI follow-up project launched in September 2003 to identify functional elements in the human genome was ENCODE, short for Encyclopedia of DNA Elements. It was designed to interpret the sequence produced by the Human Genome Project rather than merely read its DNA letters.
A genome sequence is only a starting point: researchers also need to determine which regions encode proteins or functional RNAs, regulate gene activity, influence chromosome structure, or operate only in particular cell types. ENCODE brought computational and laboratory groups together to build a catalog of these functional elements.
Its initial pilot phase examined 44 selected regions covering about 1% of the human genome, roughly 30 million base pairs. The pilot tested methods that could later be expanded to genome-wide studies, including assays of transcription, DNA-protein binding, chromatin, and regulatory activity.
HapMap is the main distractor because it was another NHGRI project, but it focused on mapping common human genetic variation. GenBank is a sequence database, and HUGO is an organization, not this functional-annotation project.