Present the Earth's Hologenome Project

2024/05/21 Etxebeste Aduriz, Egoitz - Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Eboluzioa
• Genetika
• Ekologia

They present the Earth's Hologenome Project, a global collaboration for the collection and analysis of hologenomic data from wild animals and associated microorganisms. The objective is to review the ecology and evolution from a systemic perspective of the interactions of ostentation-microbiota. EHI (Earth Hologenome Initiative) has been presented in the journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution.

Most terrestrial animals live in close interaction with micro-organisms, which influence many biological processes, both in the host, micro-organisms and in the environment. Current technology allows a detailed characterization of microbial genomes and metagenomas of the hotel owners. It is what is known as Hologenomics and offers multiple possibilities to analyze how the interactions of ostental microbiota influence on key processes such as speciation, adaptation to climate change, transmission of diseases…

“There was no infrastructure to systematically analyse interactions between animals and microorganisms,” explains Antton Alberdi Estibaritz, professor and researcher at the University of Copenhagen and coordinator of the EHI project. “Each researcher usually creates small-scale projects using their own procedures. Despite being suitable on a small scale, this poses great difficulties to make comparisons between projects and species, especially due to the high risk of technical bias in the process of generating molecular microorganism data.”

Alberdi has pointed out more reasons to launch the project: “We want to create quality, open and cheap methodologies that make molecular analysis more accessible. Most scientists use commercial kits, but in many cases they are not available in every corner of the world, and large projects may have reproductive difficulties if they base their processes on commercial solutions. If the company decides to change the product, the possibility of generating comparable data will end.”

And finally, they want it to serve to create community. “EHI is also a platform for collaboration among researchers around the world, encouraging the direct participation of local researchers, promoting the ethical use of genetic resources and creating opportunities for collaboration,” says Alberdi.