International Barcode of Life (iBOL)
Start date: July 1, 2009 This project will launch worldwide in 2010
Website: http://www.ibolproject.org/
Summary
Although its importance is undeniable, biodiversity science has never received enough investment to develop either a comprehensive inventory of life or advanced biosurveillance capacity. Canadian researchers, in co-operation with colleagues at major research facilities abroad, are working to reverse this situation through activation of the International Barcode of Life Project (iBOL). iBOL will employ sequence diversity in short, standardized gene regions (DNA barcodes) as a tool for both identifying known species and discovering new ones. By reinforcing traditional approaches that apply morphological characteristics, DNA barcoding promises to revolutionize our capacity to know and monitor biodiversity.
iBOL’s primary mission is to extend the geographic and taxonomic coverage of the barcode reference library, protect the resultant barcode records, provide community access to the knowledge they represent, and create new devices to ensure global access to this information. In addition, iBOL participants will develop the infrastructure to apply DNA barcoding in such areas as conservation, forensics, monitoring of ecosystems, and regulation of the marketplace. Within five years, participants will gather DNA barcode records from five million specimens, representing at least 500,000 species. This will produce a highly effective system for identifying species that humans encounter regularly and a solid foundation for a library to cover all of life.
Eventually, a hand-held device will allow anyone anywhere to identify species in real-time. This DNA-based identification system will affect all aspects of society’s interactions with biodiversity – conservation, control of pests and diseases, education, management of resources, production and safety of food, recreation and research.
The economic benefits will be substantial. Climate change and increasing globalization of trade expose all jurisdictions to invasive species that threaten their agriculture, forestry, and fisheries. DNA barcoding will enable prompt identification of invasive species, allowing earlier quarantine and eradication, which will massively reduce costs and increase chances of success. It will further aid selection of optimal control strategies for pest/disease agents affecting natural resource sectors. It will also help authorities to regulate trade in endangered or protected species and products.
As new sequencing technologies gain broad application, iBOL’s sequence libraries will enable environmental monitoring that will exploit living organisms as integrators of environmental change and as early warnings of damage. Large-scale, automated monitoring of species’ presence and abundance in the world’s agro-ecosystems, inland waters, oceans, and plantations will soon be routine.
A research alliance spanning 25 nations with varying levels of investment and responsibility will carry out iBOL’s work. The overall task of iBOL researchers is to collect and curate specimens, gather barcode records from them, and build an informatics platform to store these records and permit their use in identifying species. Because Canada has been a pioneer in this area, it will play a crucial role in iBOL. Research efforts will span the nation, with the Biodiversity Institute of Ontario (BIO) at the University of Guelph as iBOL’s scientific hub, operating its high-volume sequencing facility, maintaining its central informatics platform, and hosting its largest scientific team: a staff of 100 genomicists, informaticians and taxonomists.
Significant Outcomes to Date
- 2010, designated by the United Nations as the International Year of Biodiversity, will mark the launch of the International Barcode of Life (iBOL) Project.
- Representatives from iBOL met at the Third International Barcode of Life Conference (10-12 November 2009) held at the Mexican Academy of Sciences in Mexico City.
- DNA barcoding has already been used to identify falsely labeled fish in Canada and the United States and to clamp down on restaurants that sell one fish species as something else.
- The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has adopted the technology for fish identification and to distinguish the seed pods of star anise from another similar herb that contains neurotoxins.
- The U.S. Agriculture Department is also working on a global database of fruit fly barcodes to combat horticultural pests and tree barcodes to identify lumber products from endangered forests.
- Environment Canada is working with iBOL to use the technology for water quality monitoring.
- As of January 2010, the global barcoding community had assembled close to 800,000 barcode records representing over 66,000 species.
To find out more, view the video below that was made by the Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation (MRI) to highlight the Province's support for barcoding and the International Barcode of Life project (iBOL).
