Tree of Life

21 September 2023
Pine Hoverfly is back from the brink with the help of new genomes
With adult Pine Hoverflies seen in Scotland for the first time in many years, top-quality genome sequences are now helping make a permanent success of saving arguably Britain’s most endangered insect.

14 September 202317.4 min read
1,000 species get their genomes sequenced for the first time
A thousand reference genomes of the highest quality have now been produced for diverse eukaryotic species across the tree of life.

3 August 202315 min read
New Tree of Sex project collects all the wild ways nature reproduces
From sex-changing fish to asexual lizards, these and many more species will be captured in a new sex database made possible by the Wellcome Sanger Institute’s powerful genomic resources.
21 June 202319.3 min read
A barcoding buzz
Sanger researchers are involved in large-scale projects that aim to revolutionise how we monitor and understand global biodiversity – starting with insects. But some of their work is starting closer to home, working with schools and local communities to monitor insect biodiversity across Cambridgeshire and Essex.
8 December 202226.6 min read
Software to sort samples and sequence species at scale
Meet the software developers, informaticians and bioinformaticians who are helping to sequence the DNA of all life on earth.
8 December 202210.4 min read
Brazil, bats and GoaT
Find out about Genomes on a Tree (or GoaT) database, which will hold data for the hundreds of thousand of species that are currently having their genomes sequenced for the first time.
9 November 202231.2 min read
Sequencing anything, anytime, anywhere
We talk to Physilia Chua about her work to monitor biodiversity and make DNA sequencing more accessible.
10 October 20229.4 min read
Orcinus orca: How a tragic stranding helped us dive into the killer whale genome
New genome sequence will boost research into the evolution and population genetics of killer whales