WG 2.2 – Methodological Innovation

Chair: Nataly Ivanova,
Lead DNA Scientist,
Biodiversity Institute of Ontario,
University of Guelph, Canada

Vice-chair: Tom Evans,
Research Scientist,
New England Biolabs,
Ipswich, MA, USA

Major advances in barcode methodologies over the past five years have simplified the task of barcode acquisition and lowered its cost. However, there is a need for ongoing efforts to develop primer sets which are truly universal and allow barcode recovery from any eukaryote species. There is also a need for further work to deal with cases where anomalies in sequence composition, such as long runs of a single nucleotide, prevent sequencing of barcode amplicons.

iBOL will maintain a small trouble-shooting team to resolve problems encountered by other research groups within the consortium. They will also evaluate new reagents or analytical approaches that will lower the cost of barcode analysis.

Goal
Develop primer sets that allow barcode recovery from all eukaryote species. Direct effort toward the evaluation of new reagents or analytical approaches that will lower the cost of barcode analysis.