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Biologists have proposed a project that would aim to eventually sequence the genomes of all life on Earth, starting with a focus on around 9000 eukaryotic families. The project has been compared to the Human Genome Project, which completed just one "mosaic" genome at a cost of $2.7 billion in FY 1991 dollars:
When it comes to genome sequencing, visionaries like to throw around big numbers: There's the UK Biobank, for example, which promises to decipher the genomes of 500,000 individuals, or Iceland's effort to study the genomes of its entire human population. Yesterday, at a meeting here organized by the Smithsonian Initiative on Biodiversity Genomics and the Shenzhen, China–based sequencing powerhouse BGI, a small group of researchers upped the ante even more, announcing their intent to, eventually, sequence "all life on Earth."
Their plan, which does not yet have funding dedicated to it specifically but could cost at least several billions of dollars, has been dubbed the Earth BioGenome Project (EBP). Harris Lewin, an evolutionary genomicist at the University of California, Davis, who is part of the group that came up with this vision 2 years ago, says the EBP would take a first step toward its audacious goal by focusing on eukaryotes—the group of organisms that includes all plants, animals, and single-celled organisms such as amoebas.
[...] Many details about the EBP are still being worked out. But as currently proposed, the first step would be to sequence in great detail the DNA of a member of each eukaryotic family (about 9000 in all) to create reference genomes on par or better than the reference human genome. Next would come sequencing to a lesser degree a species from each of the 150,000 to 200,000 genera. Finally, EBP participants would get rough genomes of the 1.5 million remaining known eukaryotic species. These lower resolution genomes could be improved as needed by comparing them with the family references or by doing more sequencing, says EBP co-organizer Gene Robinson, a behavioral genomics researcher and director of the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology at the University of Illinois in Urbana.
(Score: 2) by canopic jug on Sunday February 26 2017, @07:25AM
Indeed. And just how will they define 'species'? In some populations, there can be two or three corner cases, and then a wide spectrum in between that clearly bear characteristics from more than one.
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(Score: 2) by takyon on Sunday February 26 2017, @07:40AM
It's pretty much there in the summary. They will start broad and then narrow as they go along to fill in the gaps. Obviously, it would be better if multiple members of each species or subspecies could be sequenced so you don't end up referencing an unfit mutant Neopetalia punctata sequence for decades. If they are lucky, the costs [genome.gov] will decline as the available equipment gets better. The Human Genome Project was completed under budget.
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(Score: 2) by gringer on Sunday February 26 2017, @10:22AM
If they are lucky, the costs will decline as the available equipment gets better.
And if they're unlucky, they'll be locked into sequencing contracts with particular providers, another technology comes along, and costs will be much higher than what could be achieved by fully independent sequencing efforts.
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(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 26 2017, @04:16PM
And if they're unlucky, they'll be locked into sequencing contracts with particular providers
That would be mismanagement not absence of good luck.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Monday February 27 2017, @07:20AM
Funny, how the word "customer lock-in" is used when the correct party profits from the arrangement, and the word "extortion" is used when it doesn't.
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