The importance of genomics in preventing pandemics

From Plant Press, Vol. 23, No. 3, July 2020.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had a major impact on human health and the global economy this year. To address future pandemics, scientists from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH), University of California at Davis (UCD), and University of Guelph (UG) recently wrote an opinion piece about the importance of genomics in facilitating preemptive strikes and developing rapid responses to global outbreaks to come. The commentary appears in the June 23, 2020 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (117: 13852-13855; http://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2009508117). In the article, authors W. John Kress (NMNH), Jonna Mazet (UCD), and Paul Hebert (UG) argue for the establishment of a global, genomic-based biosurveillance platform to detect pathogens that pose a threat to humans and other species. Such a “pandemic interception system,” they explain, would be of immense value to saving lives as well as global biosecurity, biodefense, and the world’s economy.

Chestnut blight caused by the fungus Cryphonectria parasitica devastated the American Chestnut tree more than a century ago. Photo by Joseph OBrien, USDA Forest Service / CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)

The authors discuss in detail how three major global research programs are ready to lead the way in supporting this platform: BIOSCAN (directed by Hebert), the Earth BioGenome Project (EBP; co-chaired by Kress), and the Global Virome Project (GVP; lead by Mazet). These global programs, which are currently developing approaches in comparative genomics, aim to be able to detect all pathogens hosted by birds and mammals that can be transferred to humans. But beyond protecting our own species, the authors stress that protecting other species is just as important in maintaining a healthy planet. Viruses and fungal pathogens have caused similar pandemics in cattle, amphibians, bats, honeybees, and many species of trees.

By understanding the causes and processes behind pathogen transfers, a biosurveillance platform can work proactively to prevent future infections. Kress, Mazet, and Herbert write, “now is the time to use the full power of science through cooperative efforts among initiatives such as BIOSCAN, GVP, and EBP to advance our understanding of the complex web of interactions that span the domains of life.”