On Apr. 9, 2021, the Broad Institute of MIT in partnership with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), announced it was scaling up its COVID-19 viral sequencing efforts to enable genomic surveillance of the virus in their communities.

The Broad is currently sequencing several hundred positive samples per week from the institute’s COVID-19 diagnostic facility and external partner sources, and will ramp up to 5,000 samples per week by later this spring. (December 3, 2021 update: The facility is now processing up to 10,000 samples each week. 

The Broad’s Data Sciences Platform is supporting this effort with bioinformatics tools that enable rapid data analysis and sharing with the CDC and other partners. The Broad will continue to share SARS-CoV-2 sequence data with state public health departments, the CDC, and the greater scientific community to assist with pandemic response.

As the virus spreads, it naturally acquires new mutations; some of these could make it more infectious, more dangerous to the patient, or less preventable through vaccination. By monitoring differences in the virus’s genome sequence between samples and over time, scientists can track how it is changing and identify new opportunities to control the virus’s spread, for example, by modifying a vaccine so that it protects against new, emerging variants.

Broad scientists are also working with the CDC to help coalesce a national network of sequencing centers that can offer genomic surveillance for communities across the U.S and provide a broader view of the evolution and spread of SARS-CoV-2.