In May of 1985, Robert L. Sinsheimer, then Chancellor of the University of California, Santa Cruz, conducted a workshop on the feasibility of sequencing the human genome.  Sinsheimer and his colleagues in the Biology Department had determined that the project would require developing more powerful methods for genetic mapping and cloning, an automated means of sequencing, and improved means of data storage, and invited leading scientists in all these areas to the workshop. The group determined that the task was feasible, but was split on whether it would be worth the time and funding. It would take another several years before an academic consortium could obtain the funding needed for the task. The publicly-funded Human Genome Project was officially launched in 1990, with the backing of the NIH and other organizations throughout the world.