The idea was to make a better cup of coffee.

Two years and $6 million later, Brazilian coffeemakers have mapped some 200,000 coffee DNA sequences, and identified 35,000 genes which make coffee the way it is.

Researchers say they will use the government-run database to develop, through natural means, a “super coffee” that tastes and smells good, while doubling the country’s coffee crop and cutting production costs by 20 percent.

Currently, the DNA database can only be used by the Brazilian government and applied to the country’s coffee production. But five or six years from now, researchers say the information will be open to all Brazilian companies. Foreign competitors may be able to use the information then, for a price.