On Nov. 1, 2018, the Earth BioGenome Project (EBP) was launched, a global effort to sequence the genetic code of all the planet’s eukaryotes – some 1.5 million known species, including all plants, animals, protozoa and fungi.

The Wellcome Sanger Institute that it will lead the UK contribution to the EBP by sequencing all 66,000 eukaryotic species across the British Isles, a new project known as the Darwin Tree of Life Project. The UC Davis Genome Center is the administrative home for the EBP.