Credit: Zosia Rostomian, Berkeley Lab Creative Services
In Nature Biotechnology, researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute (DOE JGI) report the release of 1,003 phylogenetically diverse bacterial and archaeal reference genomes—the single largest release to date. The effort is part of the DOE JGI’s Genomic Encyclopedia of Bacteria and Archaea (GEBA) initiative that aims to sequence thousands of bacterial and archaeal genomes to fill in unexplored branches of the tree of life. The DOE is interested in learning more about this biodiversity because microbes play important roles in regulating Earth’s biogeochemical cycles.