New effort will get genome sequences for entire Endangered Species list

一项新计划将为濒危物种名单上的所有物种进行基因组测序

The US Endangered Species Act compels the government to identify species at risk of extinction and devise plans to restore populations and the habitats they depend on. It has seen some spectacular successes, such as the restoration of the bald eagle to much of its original range. 美国《濒危物种法案》强制要求政府识别面临灭绝风险的物种，并制定计划以恢复其种群数量及它们所依赖的栖息地。该法案已取得了一些显著成就，例如白头海雕已成功恢复至其大部分原始栖息地。

But over 2,300 plant and animal populations remain on the list, requiring ongoing government intervention. On Thursday, it was announced that all of those species would see their genomes sequenced and tissue samples preserved to aid future conservation efforts. 然而，仍有超过 2,300 个动植物种群留在名单上，需要政府持续介入。周四，官方宣布将对所有这些物种进行基因组测序，并保存其组织样本，以助力未来的保护工作。

The work will be done by a partnership between two unexpected parties. One is the US government, which has generally attempted to undercut the Endangered Species Act as part of its anti-regulatory efforts. It is joined by Colossal Biosciences, a biotech company that has a controversial take on what actually constitutes a species. 这项工作将由两个意想不到的合作方共同完成。一方是美国政府，它通常试图通过反监管措施来削弱《濒危物种法案》；另一方是 Colossal Biosciences，这是一家对“何为物种”持有争议性观点的生物技术公司。

Colossal has always said it had a conservation focus, but its headline-grabbing efforts have been directed toward restoring species that have been driven to extinction. It intends to do that by developing a combination of gene editing and reproductive technologies that it expects it can profitably license. But its dire wolf announcement, in which only a tiny handful of genetic changes were edited in to grey wolves, have raised some questions about its seriousness regarding these efforts. Colossal 一直声称其专注于保护工作，但其备受瞩目的项目主要致力于恢复已灭绝的物种。该公司计划通过开发基因编辑与生殖技术的组合来实现这一目标，并期望能从中获得可盈利的授权。然而，其关于恐狼（dire wolf）的公告——仅对灰狼进行了极少数的基因编辑——引发了人们对其项目严肃性的质疑。

The new announcement, however, has a clear conservation focus. Colossal has already announced what it’s calling a BioVault, a site where tissues and reproductive cells from at-risk species can be preserved, which requires a lot of power and a constant supply of liquid nitrogen. The new program will see it add samples from all of the US’s endangered species to that vault. 不过，这项新公告有着明确的保护重点。Colossal 此前已宣布建立所谓的“生物库”（BioVault），这是一个可以保存濒危物种组织和生殖细胞的场所，需要大量的电力和持续的液氮供应。新计划将把美国所有濒危物种的样本加入该库中。

Those samples will also be used to create whole genome sequences for each of these species. The announcement calls these “biological materials that enable assisted reproduction, population genetic management, and, where species are lost, the possibility of future restoration.” 这些样本还将用于为每个物种创建全基因组序列。公告称这些是“能够实现辅助生殖、种群遗传管理，并在物种灭绝时提供未来恢复可能性的生物材料”。

The US Fish and Wildlife Service will provide the field collection and sampling expertise to populate this archive. They (and anyone else who initially obtains samples) will retain the ability to determine how any biological materials that result are used. 美国鱼类及野生动物管理局将提供实地采集和采样方面的专业知识，以充实这一档案库。他们（以及任何最初获得样本的人）将保留决定如何使用由此产生的任何生物材料的权利。

“All genomic data generated through this partnership will be deposited into open-access repositories, and provided at no cost, providing the global scientific and conservation community with the reference genomes, population-level sequence data, and bioinformatic tools needed to accelerate recovery efforts far beyond what any single agency or institution could accomplish alone,” the company’s announcement states. “通过此次合作产生的所有基因组数据都将存入开放获取的存储库，并免费提供，为全球科学界和保护界提供参考基因组、种群水平的序列数据以及生物信息学工具，从而加速恢复工作，其成效将远超任何单一机构或组织所能达到的水平，”该公司在公告中表示。

It clarified to Ars that there may be some limits on this. This is due in part to some samples originating from lands under tribal authority, and in part to specific population information that could put species at risk of poaching. 该公司向 Ars 澄清，这可能会有一些限制。部分原因是某些样本来自部落管辖的土地，另一部分原因则是某些特定的种群信息可能会使物种面临偷猎风险。