Pathogen Genomics and Global Health

Helminth infections are estimated to have a disease burden equivalent to 25% of that of HIV/AIDS and 50% of that of malaria. In recognition of the enormous health burden caused by these helminth parasites there has been an unprecedented effort, initiated by The Genome Institute (TGI) together with the Sanger Institute, to increase available parasitic helminth sequences by a few orders of magnitude, adding 60 draft genomes of species that span the two main phyla, Nematoda and Platyhelminthes. However, for almost all species, the reference genomes are from strains long maintained in a lab. There is no information on intraspecies genomic variations among natural populations. The main goal of this project is to sequence clinical isolates from different geographic regions especially in endemic areas where mass drug administration to control these infections is underway. In these areas re-infection after drug therapy is common and anthelmintic resistance is emerging and spreading as a problem.