Carl Zimmer at the New York Times discusses the Genomic Encyclopedia of Bacteria and Archaea and the recent Nature paper on the first results from the effort. So far, Jonathan Eisen and his colleagues have sequenced 56 bacterial and archaeal genomes and found 1,768 new gene families. Zimmer adds that the Joint Genome Institute has also set up an "Adopt a Genome Program" to get college students interested in the project. Eisen has links to this and other mentions of his work on his blog. "It is rare to have archaea mentioned in the New York Times," he also notes there.