Bat1K

Bat1K
Name	Bat1K
Start	2017
Coordinator	Vertebrate Genomes Project
Focus	Bat genomics
Methods	Long-read sequencing, Hi-C scaffolding, optical mapping

Bat1K

Bat1K is an international scientific initiative to generate chromosome-level genomes for all living bat species, founded to advance comparative genomics, conservation, and biomedical research. The project brings together researchers from institutions such as the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, the Broad Institute, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Max Planck Society and aligns with efforts by the Vertebrate Genomes Project, the Earth BioGenome Project, and regional museums like the Natural History Museum, London and the American Museum of Natural History.

Background

Bat1K originated in 2017 following discussions among genome scientists at meetings including the Genome Informatics Conference, the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution annual meeting, and workshops hosted by the Wellcome Genome Campus. Early leaders included investigators affiliated with the Royal Society, the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, the Wellcome Sanger Institute, and the University of Oxford. The initiative was motivated by discoveries linking bats to studies at institutions such as the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the World Health Organization, and by genomic milestones like the human genome project led by the Human Genome Project consortium, the avian genomes coordinated by the B10K Project, and the mammalian sequencing efforts of the Genome 10K community.

Goals and Objectives

Bat1K aims to produce high-quality, chromosome-level assemblies for all ~1,400 extant bat species recognized by authorities such as the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, and the Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Objectives include enabling comparative analyses across clades represented in databases maintained by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, facilitating translational research at the National Institutes of Health, informing policy at organizations like the Convention on Biological Diversity, and supporting conservation planning by agencies such as the United States Fish and Wildlife Service and the European Environment Agency.

Methods and Technologies

The project employs long-read platforms from vendors such as Pacific Biosciences and Oxford Nanopore Technologies, complementary short-read data from Illumina, proximity ligation scaffolding using Dovetail Genomics-style Hi-C protocols and technologies from companies like Arima Genomics, and optical mapping systems from Bionano Genomics. Assemblies are polished and validated using pipelines developed at the Broad Institute, the Wellcome Sanger Institute, and the European Bioinformatics Institute, and are annotated with tools from the Ensembl project and the National Center for Biotechnology Information. Sample acquisition follows permitting frameworks from authorities including the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora and institutional collections like the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and the Natural History Museum, London.

Key Findings and Publications

Published results include comparative analyses addressing immune gene evolution cited alongside studies from the Nature portfolio, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and journals such as Science Advances and Cell Reports. Findings have illuminated genetic bases of powered flight compared with work on Pterosaurs and Archaeopteryx morphology, longevity and cancer resistance linked to research at the Dana–Farber Cancer Institute and the Salk Institute, and antiviral tolerance related to investigations by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health. The consortium has produced datasets deposited in repositories maintained by the European Nucleotide Archive, the National Center for Biotechnology Information, and the DNA Data Bank of Japan, and has coauthored papers with contributors from the University of California, Berkeley, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the University of Hong Kong, and the University of São Paulo.

Collaborations and Funding

Bat1K is a distributed collaboration involving universities such as the University of Cambridge, the University of Oxford, the University of Manchester, the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and the University of Toronto; research institutes including the Wellcome Sanger Institute, the Broad Institute, the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, and the Field Museum; and conservation organizations like the Bat Conservation International and the IUCN Bat Specialist Group. Funders include philanthropic organizations such as the Wellcome Trust, governmental agencies like the UK Research and Innovation and the National Science Foundation, and international programs such as the European Union Horizon 2020 framework.

Impact and Applications

Outputs of Bat1K inform conservation actions coordinated with the IUCN Red List assessments, habitat policy linked to the Ramsar Convention, and zoonotic disease surveillance aligned with the World Health Organization and the Food and Agriculture Organization. Genomic resources support comparative studies referenced alongside work on the Human Genome Project, translational research at centers including the National Institutes of Health and the Broad Institute, and educational outreach through museums such as the American Museum of Natural History and the Natural History Museum, London. The project’s data underpin phylogenomic reconstructions related to studies from the Society of Systematic Biologists and contribute to biodiversity initiatives like the Earth BioGenome Project and the Global Genome Biodiversity Network.

Category:Genomics projects Category:Chiroptera Category:Conservation biology projects