DNA barcoding aims to protect species and food

[cory777]

Source: Reuters

Every species, from extinct to thriving, is set to get its own DNA barcode in an attempt to better track the ones that are endangered, as well as those being shipped across international borders as food or consumer products.

Researchers hope handheld mobile devices will be able to one day read these digital strips of rainbow-colored barcodes -- much like supermarket scanners -- to identify different species by testing tissue samples on site and comparing them with a digital database.

The International Barcode of Life Project (iBOL), which says it is the world's first reference library of DNA barcodes and the world's largest biodiversity genomics project, is being built by scientists using fragments of DNA to create a database of all life forms.

"What we're trying to do is to create this global library of DNA barcodes -- snippets, little chunks of DNA -- that permit us to identify species," Alex Smith, assistant professor of molecular ecology at the University of Guelph's Biodiversity Institute of Ontario, about 90 km (56 miles) west of Toronto.

Read more: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22/20101101/tsc-life-us-dna-011ccfa.html

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UNCENSORED ACTIVIST NEWS http://activistnews.blogspot.com/

[boppers]

1. Meh. Scam.

I didn't even bother clicking though to know that this is bullshit.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. Huh?

There's a strange belief held by some DUers that they feel they can dismiss a post as 'bullshit' with no explanation whatsoever. They don't even bother to make clear if they think a DUer has made something up, if a reporter has made something up, if the people the story is about have made something up, or even if their use of 'bullshit' really means "this is something I'd rather not hear about, so I'll attack it with a generic 'bullshit' tag". They just think we can read their minds, rather them having to bother typing something to expand on their favourite phrase 'bullshit'.

Our only clue is your claim that this is a "scam". OK, so you seem to think someone is making money out of someone else through fraud. What fraud? Who's making the money? Since he's the only person named in the excerpt, I presume you're accusing Alex Smith of the fraud. What, in that short excerpt, is so obviously fraud that you don't have to bother reading the article to denounce it as such?

[boppers]

5. If they can mislabel...

It doesn't matter if the label is a barcode. The scam is the idea that a different labeling system will affect anything.

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. Please tell me you're going to bother reading Viva_La_Revolution's reply #7

If clicking on the link to the story was too much effort for you, then just read what this is about inside this thread. If that's too much for you, then you are beyond hope.

[boppers]

9. I read it. They're planning on simplifying species identification with labels.

So, all you have to do to sell Bald Eagle in a supermarket is slap a label on it that says "Chicken". The only way you're going to know what a species actually *is* requires sequencing, rendering the label system pointless.

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. From the OP: "identify different species by testing tissue samples on site"

You may have read it, but you don't seem to have tried to understand it.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

4. International Barcode of Life network...

What is iBOL?
What is the Purpose of the International Barcode of Life Project?
http://ibol.org/about-us/what-is-ibol/


you should probably try opening you mind more often than you open your mouth.

[boppers]

6. International Star Registry

http://www.starregistry.com/

[Viva_La_Revolution]

7. you have a lovely day

What is iBOL?
What is the Purpose of the International Barcode of Life Project?
Life is threatened

• Life is threatened with a mass extinction event rivaling any in earth history.
• Life provides critical ecosystem services, such as pollination, nutrient recycling, food and forest products.
• Life causes major economic losses linked to pests and diseases of crops, livestock and humanity.
• Life creates complex molecules, such as antibiotics and enzymes, with tremendous economic and societal benefit.
• Life is largely unknown despite nearly three centuries of scientific endeavour.
A Neglected Science

Although its importance is undeniable, biodiversity science has never received the major investments required to develop either a comprehensive inventory of life or advanced biosurveillance capacity. Now hundreds of scientists at major international research facilities, are reversing this situation by activating the International Barcode of Life Project (iBOL).
Identification and Discovery

iBOL uses sequence diversity in short, standardized gene regions -- DNA barcodes -- as a tool for identifying known species and discovering new ones. By reinforcing traditional taxonomy, DNA barcoding is revolutionizing our capacity to know and monitor biodiversity.
The iBOL Mission

iBOL's main mission is extending the geographic and taxonomic coverage of the barcode reference library -- Barcode of Life Data Systems (BOLD) -- storing the resulting barcode records, providing community access to the knowledge they represent and creating new devices to ensure global access to this information. That includes a hand-held device that will provide real-time access to identifications by anyone in any setting.
Real World Problems

iBOL researchers will also work on applying DNA barcoding to real world problems, such as forensics, conservation, marketplace regulation, control of diseases and ecosystem monitoring. Within five years, iBOL participants will gather DNA barcode records from five million specimens, representing at least 500,000 species. This will produce an excellent identification system for economically, socially or environmentally important species and a solid foundation for subsequent work on barcode reference library for all life.
Wide-ranging Impacts

Once implemented, this DNA-based identification system will exert broad impacts on all areas in which society interacts with biodiversity - pest and disease control, food production and safety, resource management, conservation, research, education, and recreation.
Economic Benefits

The economic benefits of improved biosurveillance will be large. Increasing globalization of trade and climate change means that all jurisdictions face unprecedented exposure to invasive species that threaten their agriculture, forestry and fisheries. DNA barcoding will enable the rapid identification of invasive species, allowing quarantine and eradication efforts to begin far earlier, with massive reductions in cost and increased chances of success. It will further aid the selection of optimal control strategies for pest/disease agents impacting all natural resource sectors. Barcoding will play a critical role in regulating trade in endangered or protected species and products.
Early Warnings

As massively parallel sequencing technologies become more available, the barcode library will enable sophisticated environmental monitoring that uses 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 oceans, inland waters, agro-ecosystems, and plantations will soon be routine.
Research Alliance

iBOL’s work will be carried out by a research alliance spanning 26 nations with varying levels of investment and responsibilities will vary. The overall task of iBOL researchers is collecting and curating specimens, gathering barcode records from them and building the informatics platform needed to store these records and to enable their use in species identification.

A Central Role

Because Canada has led the early development of this DNA-based identification system, it will play a central role in iBOL. Research involvements will span the nation, but the Biodiversity Institute of Ontario (BIO) and its staff of 100 genomicists, informaticians and taxonomists will be iBOL’s scientific hub, operating its high-volume sequencing facility, maintaining its central informatics platform and hosting its largest scientific team.

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

3. I'll bet Monsanto is around the corner waiting...

and getting ready to copyright what they can.