i5K Coordinating Group

Conference Call Agenda

May 19, 2021

11:00-12:00 (EDT)

Attending: Glenn Hanes, Monica Poelchau, Kevin Hackett, Brian Scheffler, Rob Waterhouse, Marian Goldsmith, Duane McKenna, Surya Saha, Robert Miller, Anna Childers, Brad Coates, Jay Evans, Gene Robinson, Chris Childers, Catherine Hill, Meg Allen, Glenn Scole

_We will continue to discuss moving forward this year, following on the success of sequencing projects and technology development, and some very successful virtual conferences. _

  • Meetings
    • PAG-substitution Virtual Arthropod Genomics Workshop (Brad)
    • EBP Annual Meeting (Mark)
      • i5K Session (Anna, Rob). Surya, Rob, Josh and Kristen discussed what the format should be. The goal is to actively push arthropod talks into general sessions. For i5k, a short one-hour slot for community/panel discussion. They would like to invite those who submit arthropod-related talks in the general sessions to the i5k panel discussion, as well as other non-arthropod people (e.g. a genome assembly expert). Will continue to use AGS Slack workspace for offline conversations or other discussions.
      • Rob is now vice-chair of ERGA - the European node of EBP. 12 bees are on the pilot list (still needs review, but arthropods are represented!)
    • ESA (Denver) - member symposium approved - on Ag100Pest + i5k oct31-nov3: Advancing Insect Genomics Through the Ag100Pest and i5K Initiatives by Organizers: Brad Coates and Sheina Sim
  • Project – Updates
    • EBP (Kevin, Gene, fringy)
      • National strategy for genome sequencing is in the current presidential budget. Endless frontier act out of committee now. EBP worked on crafting that language. If approved, provides a possible avenue for more funding for genome sequencing. Focus on creating biological data infrastructure for the future.
    • Ag100Pest Update (Anna)
      • Ticks - there are 10 ticks in the pipeline. Catherine Hill, Glen Scoles, and Robert Miller are Ag100Pest tick champions. Ag100Pest wants to start doing regular stakeholder meetings to keep community/genome champions apprised of progress. Kate: there is a global ixodes genome consortium - looking at key species, population genetics and genomics, microbiomes. Anna - UMD is working with PacBio on a tick species using a somewhat unorthodox approach - combining low and ultra-low input methods. D. andersoni example - 70.4 contig n50, 743 contigs, 2752.5 Mb genome size.
    • Bee Genomes (Kevin, Gene, Jay)
      • There is a new congressional allocation towards bee genomics. Focus will be on sequencing pollinator/bee genomes. Jay Evans will lead the project. Collaboration between ARS and University of Illinois. Still in beginning stages and planning of all aspects of the project. Duration is likely 2 years. Species choice will be based on scientific and financial considerations (e.g. how many reference vs. draft quality genomes, phylogenetic relationships between candidate species). Project fits within i5k and EBP. Agricultural focus due to pollination aspect.Need to look at logistics (materials available, specimen acquisitions, informatics, etc.)
      • Some feedback from Brian and Anna- bee DNA can still be difficult to work with, but cautiously optimistic. The fresher the sample, the better - make sure that you sample as many as you can during the correct season. Can get 30x coverage from a single bee. Ag100Pest can share information on project organization and techniques (including budget recommendations, granted that Ag100Pest can be more cost-effective). Meg suggests that the samples should be pre-adult if possible. Jay suggest bee abdomens could cause the problems with DNA degradation (from another reference)
      • i5k@NAL and others e.g. Hymenoptera Genome Database - bioinfo, databases, support, all need to be part of the budget conversation

NEXT MEETING: June 16, 2021

11:00-12:00 am EDT