Global Voices, Global Genomes
Biodiversity Genomics in a Landmark Year
Across taxa, continents, and disciplines, 2025 marked a year when biodiversity genomics translated ambition into published impact. EBP-affiliated projects delivered reference genomes, analytical frameworks, and methodological advances that deepen our understanding of life on Earth while strengthening shared standards for quality, openness, and reuse. Together, these publications reflect a global community turning large-scale sequencing into durable scientific, conservation, and societal value.
Project Psyche: reference genomes for all Lepidoptera in Europe
“Sequencing all 11,000 species will set a sound foundation for genomics and greatly foster monitoring of all Lepidoptera in Europe, empowering effective biodiversity management and policy, locally and globally.”
Project Psyche at the Wellcome Sanger Institute
Authors: Charlotte J. Wright, Niklas Wahlberg, Roger Vila, Marko Mutanen, Pável Matos-Maraví, Kay Lucek, Irena Kleckova, Leonardo Dapporto, Vlad Dincă, Claudia Bruschini, Christopher W. Wheat, Marta Vila, Laura Torrado-Blanco, Valentina Todisco, Michal Rindos, Petr Nguyen, Peter O. Mulhair, Stefaniya Kamenova, Marcus Hicks, Marianne Espeland, Ines A. Drinnenberg, Mónica Doblas-Bajo, Richard I. Bailey, the Project Psyche Community, Mark Blaxter, and Joana I. Meier.
Journal: Trends in Ecology and Evolution (2025)
Gypsy moth (Lymantria dispar) — a close-up of a globally impactful forest insect.
On the path to reference genomes for all biodiversity: lessons learned and laboratory protocols created in the Sanger Tree of Life core laboratory over the first 2000 species.
“Here, we detail the different workflows we have developed to successfully process a wide variety of species, covering plants, fungi, chordates, protists, arthropods, meiofauna and other metazoa. We summarise our success rates and describe how to best apply and combine the suite of current protocols, which are all publicly available at protocols.io.”
Authors: Howard, C., Brown, T., Chrysostomakis, I., Arantes, L. S., Gerheim, C., Schell, T., Schneider, C., et al.
Journal: bioRxiv
Published: 2025
THE EARTH BIOGENOME PROJECT PHASE II: ILLUMINATING THE EUKARYOTIC TREE OF LIFE
With the right coordination and partnerships, reference-quality genomes at scale are achievable.
Authors: Mark Blaxter, Harris Lewin, Federica Di Palma, Richard Challis, Manuela da Silva, Richard Durbin, Giulio Formenti, Nico Franz, Roderic Guigó, Peter W. Harrison, Michael Hiller, Katharina J. Hoff, Kerstin Howe, Erich Jarvis, Mara Lawniczak, Kerstin Lindblad-Toh, Debra Mathews, Fergal J. Martin, Camila Mazzoni, Ann McCartney, Nicola Mulder, Sadye Páez, PhD, MSPT, MPH, Kim D. Pruitt, Verena Ras, Oliver Ryder, Lesley Shirley, Françoise Thibaud-Nissen, Tandy Warnow, Robert Waterhouse, and the EBP Community of Scientists
Journal: Frontiers in Science
Date: Sept 4, 2025
Slime molds — tiny, extraordinary life forms revealing the diversity of eukaryotes.
Sea turtle diving gracefully beneath the surface.
Haplotype-resolved reference genomes of the sea turtle clade unveil ultra-syntenic genomes with hotspots of divergence.
“Our analysis reveals remarkable genome synteny and collinearity across all species, despite the clade’s origin dating back more than 60 million years.”
Vertebrate Genomes Project together with experts from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), CSIRO Australia, and the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Germany)
Authors: Larissa S. Arantes, Tom Brown, Diego De Panis, Scott D. Whiting, Erina J. Young, Erin L. LaCasella, Gabriella A. Carvajal, Adam Kennedy, Deana Edmunds, Blair P. Bentley, Jennifer Balacco, Conor Whelan, Nivesh Jain, Tatiana Tilley, Brian O’Toole, Patrick Traore, Erich D. Jarvis, Oliver Berry, Peter H. Dutton, Lisa M. Komoroske, Camila J. Mazzoni.
Journal: GigaScience.
Published: 2025
