The Southern white rhino Edward samples a birthday box of hay in 2020. Southern white rhinos are connected to the effort to revive the critically endangered northern white rhino, which has deposits in the Frozen Zoo. (File photo by Ken Bohn/San Diego Zoo Global)
Illumina and the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance announced a sequencing agreement Tuesday for the Frozen Zoo, a collection of biological samples from threatened and endangered species.
Illumina, which specializes in DNA sequencing, will work on up to 4,000 samples representing 1,300 species in the Frozen Zoo. The data collected will be used for research into wildlife medicine, evolutionary biology and biodiversity preservation, according to a company statement.
“Illumina is proud to partner with SDZWA to power the next era of the Frozen Zoo,” said Cande Rogert, vice president and global head of advanced sciences at Illumina. “This collaboration is a wonderful example of the way multiomic technologies can activate the potential of these critical biodiversity biobanks.”
Multiomic research is a biological analysis approach in which the data consists of multiple “omes,” such as the genome, epigenome and microbiome.
Biobanks such as the Frozen Zoo serve as a repository of “increasingly fragile biodiversity,” the statement continues. By sequencing those collected samples, researchers can gain insights that help protect species and promote ecological resilience.
Stored in liquid nitrogen at minus 320 degrees Fahrenheit, the collection includes cells, embryos and gametes from mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, plants, marine invertebrates and insects.
“This collaboration marks a new era of genomic discovery that will accelerate our capacity to halt and reverse biodiversity loss,” said Megan Owen, the alliance’s vice president of conservation science. “The next fifty years of the Frozen Zoo will rely on a global network of conservation scientists, as well as scalable multiomic technology to maximize the impact of biobanked samples.”
Illumina will generate whole-genome sequencing data from samples representing wildlife in the Frozen Zoo, which will be made available for research to the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance and its collaborators.
A selection of the samples will be available for collaborative research projects, where Illumina’s multiomic solutions will “help conservation researchers unlock information about genetic diversity and population history,” officials said.
“My father, Dr. Kurt Benirschke, founded the Frozen Zoo way back in 1975, believing it was important to preserve the DNA of rare and endangered species, but not knowing exactly why or how,” said Rolf Benirschke, chair of the SDZWA Board of Trustees. “If he were alive today, he would be smiling knowing that his vision has led to this important collaboration with Illumina that will dramatically expand and amplify the science of conservation.”
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