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In April 2024, the project “A new reference genome for the conservation of coastal species in the face of anthropogenic change” was selected in the ERGA-BGE call "Enhancing Biodiversity Genomics Applications for Ongoing Case Studies". The project involves researchers from the University of Barcelona (Barcelona, Spain) and the University of La Laguna (Canary Islands, Spain). This initiative is dedicated to generating a high-quality reference genome for D. curvisetae . This resource will significantly enhance our understanding of the genomic basis of adaptation and the mechanisms driving genetic diversity across species. The project, led by Prof. Julio Rozas, Dr. Sara Guirao-Rico, and Dr. Nuria Macías-Hernández, will accelerate the use of new high-quality reference genomes relevant for understanding, monitoring, and conserving biodiversity. Research activities include sampling campaigns to collect D. curvisetae  specimens from the coasts of Tenerife and the generation of a genome assembly and annotation. The group has a consolidated line of research that focuses on the radiation of animal species on oceanic islands based on the case study of the adaptive radiation of the spider genus Dysdera  in the Canary Islands. Previous research results include the identification of molecular targets of adaptive convergence in phenotypic traits related to trophic specialization in these islands. The current project is generating new reference genomes at the chromosome level for species that inhabit the intertidal zones of pebble beaches on seashores. The coastal areas of Tenerife have been one of the most degraded habitats in the last years, mainly due to urban development - can people and the native biodiversity coexist on the island’s shore? Species photo: Pedro Oromí This type of habitat is unique among the species of this genus, and only reported in some Macaronesian species. It represents a new case of ecological shift found in the genus Dysdera . This provides a great opportunity to investigate habitat specialization as a novel driver of species radiation, but more importantly, to envisage how these highly specialized organisms adapt to habitats particularly vulnerable to anthropogenic effects. The coastal areas of the Canary Islands have been one of the most degraded habitats in the last thirty years, mainly due to urban development, and this trend is still increasing. Members of the research team Julio Rozas, Sara Guiaro-Rico, Nuria Macías-Hernández, Vadim Pisarenco, Silvia García and Marta Olivé look  for spiders among the rocky sea shore of Tenerife. Photos by Julio Rozas and Sara Guirao-Rico This project will be the benchmark to boost knowledge of the genomic basis of convergent adaptation and the generation and maintenance of diversity associated with insular radiations. In addition, the results of this project will be important for predicting how factors such as coastal degradation, sea level rise, desalination, and other human-induced impacts will affect these organisms and their adaptive potential. Using the genomic information generated by this project, conservation initiatives can be implemented for a variety of species or evolutionary lineages exhibiting characteristics peculiar to coastal ecosystems that have traditionally been overlooked by conservation programs. The leading researchers of this project would like to extend their gratitude to all the members of the University of Barcelona and the University of La Laguna research team for their commitment and dedication, as well as to all the collaborators who participated in the sampling campaign. This project received funding from the European Union under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme, co-funded by the Swiss Government and the British Government, with additional support from national research grants. We also thank BGE-ERGA for providing a collaborative platform that made this research possible. About the Authors Prof. Julio Rozas, Dr. Sara Guirao-Rico, and Dr. Nuria Macías-Hernández are part of ERGA SPAIN. You can find more information about their research at   https://www.ub.edu/molevol/julio/  and https://portalciencia.ull.es/grupos/6542/detalle

This ERGA-BGE project, started in June 2024 and led by Dr. Justyna Kubacka, builds upon an ongoing study on the conservation genomics of the aquatic warbler, a threatened bird of highly fragmented central-European wetland. Under the ERGA-BGE umbrella, the project aims to whole-genome resequence around 20 individuals of the aquatic warbler from two populations. Samples were collected by Prof. Andrzej Dyrcz, Dr. Benedikt Giessing, Dr. Jarosław Krogulec, and Grzegorz Kiljan in the 1990s, and by Dr. Kubacka in the 2010s. The birds were sampled in one of the species' strongholds, the Biebrza Valley in the northeast of Poland, which hosts about 25% of the global population, and in the currently extinct breeding site in Western Pomerania at the Polish-German border. The two regions are approx. 600 km apart with only scarce breeding habitat in between. The project will focus on two populations of aquatic warbler: a larger population from the well-preserved Biebrza Valley marshes and a population from Western Pomerania that is currently extinct. Photos by Justyna Kubacka and Knyva. The ERGA-BGE project aims to complement the ongoing study with a more thorough evaluation of genomic inbreeding, effective population size, and genetic bottlenecks, as well as adaptive variation and population structure between the two distant populations. The results of the project will help us understand the extent of the loss of genetic diversity and its contribution to the decline of the aquatic warbler.  They will inform translocation of the species, which is being carried out to restore the extinct population in Western Pomerania.  Importantly, the ERGA-BGE project will use the recently finished chromosome-level reference genome of the aquatic warbler.    Looking for the tiny aquatic warbler across the vast landscape of the Biebrza Valley. Photo by Szczepan Skibicki. The research activities included fieldwork in remote mires to catch and blood-sample aquatic warblers. The samples collected in the 1990s were deposited in the Dresden Senckenberg Museum (Germany). Dr Kubacka extracted DNA from these samples on her visit to the Museum at the beginning of 2024. She is also curating a collection of aquatic warbler DNA samples, which will be used for the ERGA-BGE project. The project is expected to draw the attention of the scientific community as it will explore the past and present conservation genomics of a migratory bird that is a habitat specialist breeding in a vanishing wetland habitat. Handling and sampling small birds such as the aquatic warbler requires expertise and a lot of care. Photos by Irene Arnaldos Giner and Anna Dubiec. The study is funded by the German Ornithological Society (DO-G) and through EU Life programme resources awarded to Förderverein Naturschutz im Peenetal e.v., Germany, and the Baltic Environmental Forum, Lithuania. It is being carried out in collaboration with Prof. Michael Wink, Dr. Volker Salewski, and Dr. Martin Paeckert. It would not be made possible without the collectors, who laboriously obtained samples from breeding sites covering the whole breeding range of the species, including those as distant and remote as Western Siberia. The whole-genome resequencing part of the project will be performed thanks to funding from the European Union under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme, co-funded by the Swiss Government and the British Government. About the Author: Dr. Justyna Kubacka is an evolutionary ecologist and ornithologist. She works in the Museum and Institute of Zoology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw. She belongs to the aquatic warbler genome team of the ERGA Pilot reference genome project.

We are pleased to announce the 20 projects that have been selected as part of the recent ERGA-BGE call "Enhancing Biodiversity Genomics Applications for Ongoing Case Studies" . The projects selected are on-going initiatives that leverage high-quality reference genomes to boost biodiversity conservation or to investigate how sustainably managed species contribute to our economy and health. The funding will be used to bring the relevant reference genomes up to Earth BioGenome Project (EBP)  standards or, for projects already meeting these criteria, to generate genomic data to enhance and complete the research - such as population re-sequencing data. Stay tuned for blog posts, updates and research outcomes of each of these projects reported here in the ERGA Blog! In the interactive map below you can explore the partner institutions distributed across Europe and the topic of each of the projects: This is a subcontracting task of the BGE Project and coordinated by the associated partner's team at the Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics . 📢 Stay tuned! In the coming weeks, we'll be introducing and highlighting the case studies through posts written by the scientists leading each project!

Every six years, the botanical community convenes for what has been called their “Olympic Games”: the International Botanical Congress . This year, the XXth congress brought over 3 000 attendees from all parts of the world from 21st to 27th July to sunny Madrid – during a major heatwave. Among them were several ERGA members, aiming to make contact among each other and to get more botanists involved in our initiative. Additionally, this was a great opportunity to exchange with other large-scale sequencing projects targeting plants, such as GAP  (Genomics for Australian Plants), 10KP  (Ten Thousand Plant Genomes) and DToL  (Darwin Tree of Life), putting ERGA on the map as the only cross-borders and community-driven initiative among them.  Katja inviting all IBC attendees to the ERGA satellite meeting at the end of her talk, which highlighted the importance of common standards and reproducibility in large-scale reference genome production. (Photo: Sophie Maiwald) Already on Tuesday evening, the symposium “Large-scale Generation and Utilisation of Reference-Quality Genomes from Plants”, organised by Peter Hollingsworth (Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh) and Sean Graham (University of British Columbia), and the ensuing workshop of the 10KP project sparked heated discussions. These ranged from fair attribution and involvement of sample providers and other experts, open data access and findable vouchers, capacity building and “helicopter” science, i.e. the study of a country’s biodiversity without involving any local researchers, to the inequality of opportunities among the global North and South, which is further exacerbated by current technological limits such as the necessity of liquid nitrogen freezing. Specifically with respect to ERGA, several participants asked how they could contribute community genomes . The new ERGA badges served their purpose well and the ERGA satellite meeting was announced in all central places. (Photos: Katja Reichel) Although the meteorological conditions and a wave of COVID infections had somewhat diminished the field, over 20 attendees currently based e.g. in Spain, Portugal, France, Great Britain, Germany, Austria, Italy and Hungary – plus guests from China and Australia – also came to the ERGA plant specialists’ IBC satellite meeting on Wednesday afternoon. There, Katja Reichel gave an introduction to ERGA and to several current endeavours craving input from the plant community, such as the rogue genomes working group  and plant sampling SOP . About half of the group then stayed on to network and discuss general issues during plant reference genome production. This included topics as diverse as the lack of funding opportunities for big genomes (such as present in many plants), the missing overview of the species whose genomes are currently being sequenced (and by whom / prioritisation), the lack of software adapted e.g. to genomes of uneven ploidy or including huge repeat clusters which defy even long-read sequencing, the challenges of genome annotation , problems with high molecular weight (HMW) DNA extraction, as well as the isolation of plant genome scientists even within ERGA. However, the meeting also brought forth the expertise which already exists on some of these issues, and highlighted the need to connect and join forces. You can find the slides presented by Katja here .   Both from the meeting and from further conference break discussions arose several ideas for action. These include a more proactive, transparent communication on the aims and “rules” of ERGA within the (plant) science community and also towards partner projects such as DToL, the registration of ongoing reference genome sequencing projects, including community genomes, e.g. through GoaT , the establishment of a reporting standard for both successful and failed HMW DNA extractions alike, and a dedicated keybase channel for, as well as regular online / hybrid meetings of, the ERGA plant specialist community.    Hoping that these ideas will gradually be implemented, we thank Luisa Marins, Chiara Bortoluzzi and Christian de Guttry for help with the organisation and advertisement for the satellite meeting, all participants and discussion partners for their contributions, as well as the IBC organisers for giving us this opportunity to connect. About the Author Katja Reichel  is co-chair of the Sampling and Sample Processing Committee and regularly speaks out for plants within the ERGA community. At the IBC, she presented a bioinformatic pipeline  for the standardised generation of annotated plastid genomes from Illumina short reads. Her research on population and conservation genomics of partially clonal plants currently focuses on Arnica montana   and is partially financed by the Biodiversity Genomics Europe project.

In June 2024, Camille Cornet, researcher at the Swiss University of Neuchâtel , embarked on an exciting case study connected to Biodiversity Genomics Europe . This project is centred on the remarkable biodiversity of alpine butterflies, in particular the genus Erebia , whose species can be found throughout Europe. Some species are widespread, when others are localized and often endangered. Localized species are particularly threatened by climate change and land use, making this project important to implement future conservation measures. The primary goal of the project is to assess the functional genomic diversity of Erebia in the context of adaptation to environmental change. The results will be instrumental for conservation of Erebia  and will underscore the importance of genomic information for efficient biodiversity management. A great adventure: the team of scientists travelled all the way from France to Georgia in search of alpine butterflies to sample and study. After an idyllic yet intense period of fieldwork ranging from the French Massif Central over the Alps to the Caucasus in Georgia, the research team successfully sampled butterflies of a dozen Erebia  species, and sequenced and assembled their genomes. Preliminary results uncovered hidden genetic diversity as many species differ greatly in their number of chromosomal rearrangements. These substantial differences have been suggested to play a role in species diversification. To further elucidate the importance of genetic diversity for adaptation to climate change, the next stage involves annotating the genomes to pinpoint gene locations. This step is crucial to determine where important functional diversity exists within the genomes and whether they mediate genomic rearrangements. The 12 butterfly genomes sequenced revealed great genetic diversity within the genus Erebia - many species differ in their number of chromosomal rearrangements. This BGE Case Study on alpine butterflies highlights the importance of cutting-edge genomics research to provide the resources for their future conservation. As climate change coupled with habitat loss continues to threaten biodiversity, such investigations become essential. Stay tuned for more updates on our findings and their implications for conservation! This work would not be possible without the invaluable help of Tinatin Chkhartishvili and Giorgi Iankoshvili from Ilia State University in Georgia, and Yannick Chittaro and Andreas Sanchez from InfoFauna in Switzerland to collect specimens. This project has received funding from the European Union under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme, co-funded by the Swiss Government and the British Government. About the Author: Camille Cornet is a member of the ERGA community, participating in the ERGA effort by sequencing genomes of, among others, Erebia  butterflies. Camille is part of the Biodiversity Genomics Lab  at University of Neuchâtel. Photo credits: Camille Cornet and Giorgi Iankoshvili

Plant biologists from Umeå Plant Science Centre in northern Sweden are excited to be sampling the first individuals from a new collection of aspen trees. This will kick off a long-term project about genetic diversity in Nordic aspen trees (NordAsp). The NordAsp project studies natural genetic diversity in aspen, Populus tremula, along a climatic gradient across northern Norway and Sweden. Last summer, the roots of wild aspen trees were dug from more than 1200 locations spanning the Scandinavian peninsula, and new plants were propagated from those roots. Next year, 700 of these will be planted in new field experiments in both countries. Already this July, leaf samples will be harvested so that DNA can be extracted from representative trees to get advance knowledge about the genetic diversity of NordAsp. The NordAsp project studies natural genetic diversity in aspen, Populus tremula, along a climatic gradient across northern Norway and Sweden. Plants were sampled from root cuttings in 1200 locations and propagated in a greenhouse. The ERGA project investigates genetic variation in a selection of 40 individuals representing the sampling gradient. Photos Credit: Urška Klepec, Maxime Chantreau Previous research has shown that there is a huge amount of genetic variation among aspens on the landscape. Aspens are very heterozygous, meaning that individuals are genetically very different to each other – just like humans are. The DNA sequencing of the first 40 individuals of the NordAsp collection will give us the opportunity to look at variation in DNA sequences among representative trees growing along our east to west sampling transects. We will see how the trees differ as individuals, looking for contrasting patterns of inheritance in their genetic sequences. We will also get information that helps us plan the DNA sequencing of all 700 aspens in our new common garden experiments, for example which sequencing technologies to use. The data will lead us to a new wealth of knowledge about the biology of an ecological keystone species. Information about genetic variation along this extreme climatic transect will also help us predict the resilience of this species – and its dependent flora and fauna – when faced with future climate scenarios. The Aspen Across the Seasons: how resilient are the trees to a changing climate? The answer lies in their genes. This project was led by Prof. Stefan Jansson and was made possible by the sampling efforts of 35 researchers from UPSC and plant propagation by Skogfork, an essential stakeholder in this project. Leaves from the new plants will be sampled by Nathaniel Street and Kathryn Robinson, with DNA preparation by Vikash Kumar. We are grateful to the Trees for the Future (T4F, a subsidiary of Trees and Crops for the Future, TC4F), and the Biodiversity Genomic Europe (BGE) project for financial support.   About the Author: Nathaniel Street is Professor of Forest Tree Genomics at Umeå University and leader of the NordAsp BGE project. Visit our homepage , lab page and read more about the T4F project at https://www.slu.se/en/Collaborative-Centres-and-Projects/trees-and-crops-for-the- future/

In June 2024, a collaborative project started between the Centre for Ecology, Evolution, and Environmental Changes (CE3C) , at the Faculty of Sciences, University of Lisbon, Portugal, and Biodiversity Genomics Europe (BGE) . The project is led by Octávio S. Paulo and André F. Henriques and aims at evaluating, in three regions of Portugal, the potential impact of Small-Scale Farming (SSF) on the genetic variability and adaptation of three wild bee species: Andrena flavipes  (Panzer, 1799), Bombus terrestris  (Linnaeus, 1758), and Lasioglossum malachurum  (Kirby, 1802). Our hypothesis posits that Small-Scale Farming landscapes may positively influence the genetic diversity of these three common wild bees species, thereby promoting their adaptation to the crop mosaic seen in these landscapes. Using data from ESRI | Sentinel-2 Land Cover 2022 we chose three regions of Portugal with suitable areas for two contrasting landscapes: low agriculture landscapes (LoA) and Small-Scale Farming landscapes (SFF). An extensive field work was done across these three regions of Portugal, where samples from the three target species were collected. These samples will be processed in the CE3C facilities, in Lisbon, to obtain high-quality genomic DNA and subsequently shipped to state-of-the-art laboratories to perform next-generation sequencing of pooled samples (Pool-seq).  In search of native bees: The project included extensive field work to collect samples from the three target species. | Photo taken by Eduardo Sousa. To test our hypothesis, we will combine high-quality reference genomes and the pool-seq data for the three species, to compare, within each region and between the three different regions, the SSF and LoA landscapes. Preliminary results based on RAD-seq data seem to support our hypothesis. This innovative project not only enhances our scientific understanding of the genetic status of three important wild bee species but also highlights the importance of genomics in biodiversity conservation. Should our hypothesis prove correct, the results could be relevant for designing a conservation plan for wild bees, guided by genetic and genomic principles and the capacity of these species to adapt to small-scale farming landscapes. This project has received funding from the European Union under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme, co-funded by the Swiss Government and the British Government, with additional support from national research grants FCT 2022.14424.BD awarded to André F. Henriques and FCT Unit funding UID/BIA/00329/2019. We also extend our gratitude to BGE-ERGA for providing the collaborative platform that made this research possible.   About the Authors: Octávio S. Paulo and André F. Henriques are members of the ERGA Portugal and participate in the ERGA Sequencing & Assembly , Annotation and Data Analysis Committees. Octávio S. Paulo leads the CoBiG2 group of CE3C and André F. Henriques is a PhD student in the same group. More information can be found at CoBiG2 group. Photo credits: Lasioglossum malachurum : By James Lindsey at Ecology of Commanster, CC BY-SA 2.5 Andrena flavipes : Fritz Geller-Grimm, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons Bombus terrestris : Paulo Costa, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Are you a plant specialist interested in boosting genomic resources for the European flora? ERGA will host a satellite meeting during this year's International Botanical Congress  on July 21 - 27 in Madrid, Spain. Join us - in presence or online - to learn more about ERGA, meet other members and network with researchers with similar interests. More details: ERGA plant specialist meeting 🕒 Wednesday July 24th, 15:00 - 18.00 📍 Room N107+8 🔗 Zoom link for remote participants The European Reference Genome Atlas (ERGA) is a continental-scale initiative under the umbrella of the Earth Biogenome Project (EBP), bringing together researchers across all taxonomic groups and experts on all stages of reference genome generation, for the common aim of producing high-quality reference genomes for all eukaryotic species inhabiting Europe. This meeting shall be an in-person get-together for all plant scientists within ERGA, with the possibility of virtual participation for those who could not make it to the IBC. We particularly welcome plant scientists of all career stages who are not yet members, but interested in learning more about ERGA and in joining our initiative. Agenda 1) Short introduction to ERGA + ways to participate 2) Ongoing ERGA plant community projects 3) Ideas and plans Please reach out to Katja Reichel ( katja.reichel@fu-berlin.de ) if you would like to support the organization of this meeting, give a short account about your participation in ERGA, co-chair part of the event, or add more ideas to the agenda..

The ERGA Knowledge Hub  is live! The main goal of this new portal is to gather and share educational materials on genomics and related topics, lowering access barriers and promoting knowledge exchange across Europe and beyond. Links to various types of training materials are available in the Hub, including lectures PDFs, videos, GitHub pages, interactive content. The Hub will collect content covering all steps relevant to production and application of reference genomes and genomic data  - from data generation and analysis to the ethical and social aspects that the workflow entails. This collection of educational materials is built based on the community’s input and everyone is welcome to submit their own educational materials or those from others - as long as a licence that allows free distribution and sharing with or without accreditation is provided. All the material available in the Hub is curated by a team of ERGA committee coordinators, ensuring the high quality of the content.  The ERGA Knowledge Hub was made possible thanks to Biodiversity Genomics Europe  (BGE) funded by the European Union under the Horizon Europe research and innovation program, co-funded by the Swiss and British governments. The portal was developed by the ERGA Training & Knowledge transfer Committee  in collaboration with the Swiss Institute for Bioinformatics.  Contribute! To submit a link to the collection, you just need to click on “ Contribute !” on the upper right corner of the Knowledge Hub.  You’ll need to select the type of license associated with this resource - if no licensing information is available on the page, you can try contacting the authors and ask if they agree to have their materials linked in the Hub. ⏯️ To learn more about the ERGA Knowledge Hub watch the Camila Mazzoni's presentation introducing the Hub to the Earth Biogenome Community: -- If you have any questions or suggestions related to the ERGA Knowledge Hub, please contact us at training@erga-biodiversity.eu.

June saw the annual meeting of Galaxy  developers and users at the Galaxy Community Conference 2024  in Brno, Czechia. This year over 150 participants came together to share updates to the Galaxy platform and present use-cases showing how Galaxy has enabled high-quality science through providing computational infrastructure and software support. Galaxy has established open computational servers in the United States , Europe  and Australia  alongside a suite of tools to give scientists the opportunity to process and analyse data of any size without the need to establish or use a local High Performance Computing service.  During the 4-day conference ERGA, the Vertebrate Genomes Project  and the wider Earth BioGenome Project  were well-represented, demonstrating how Galaxy fits into a distributed model of reference genome generation. Updates to the VGP pipeline were presented by Delphine Lariviere and Linelle Abueg, showcasing how they have used a Galaxy server at the Vertebrate Genomes Lab to assemble over 150 species. They also introduced the efforts made to assist manual curation of the assemblies.  The VGP uses their published pipelines and training material to give instructional workshops on how anyone can use Galaxy to assemble a genome without access to an HPC or even needing to install any software. Within the ERGA framework, Tom Brown presented how collaborators from Galaxy EU are helping ERGA to establish a review system for genome assembly via the ERGA Assembly Report ( EAR ) and assist the genome annotation community in installing necessary tools and developing workflows that enable researchers to annotate their favourite genome using best-practice tools and pipelines. You can learn more about the VGP’s efforts to assemble vertebrate genomes in their paper published in Nature Biotechnology  and read about ERGA’s efforts to benchmark annotation tools and workflows on a diverse range of organisms in their report from last year’s BioHackathon Europe . Click to check the poster and slides presented at the conference: The Galaxy Community Conference 2024 presented a fantastic opportunity for developers, systems administrators and researchers from the genomics, astronomy and material science communities to come together and hear about the latest advancements in Galaxy and its uses. Many thanks to the organisers and especially Björn Grüning and Anton Nekrutenko for their support given to the biodiversity genomics community. About the Author Tom Brown is the coordinator of the ERGA IT & Infrastructure Committee and also participates in the ERGA Sequencing & Assembly and Annotation Committees .

Dozens of scientific institutions and laboratories open their doors and invite visitors to discover their current research by interacting with scientists in an informal, playful atmosphere - that’s the spirit of the Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften  (“Long Night of Science”) which happens every summer in Berlin. On Saturday, June 22nd, 2024, Biodiversity Genomics Europe and ERGA participated in the event for the first time with a stand organised by the BGE team from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research  at Haus der Leibniz-Gemeinschaft in the heart of the German capital. Our main goal was to spread information about BGE and the European Reference Genome Atlas  (ERGA), highlighting the urgent need for conservation efforts for European species and discussing how state-of-the-art genomic technologies are helping to improve our understanding of biodiversity and advance its protection. We developed an interactive guessing game that allowed visitors to test their knowledge about some of the species that are having their genomes sequenced by BGE - with a particular focus on those of conservation concern.  Some snapshots of a very busy evening at the Haus der Leibniz-Gemeinschaft. You can find more photos of other activities here . Photos: Donat Agosti and Diego de Panis The board game attracted visitors of all ages - including families with children, young adults, and senior citizens - through the duration of the event and promoted an exciting dialogue with this varied audience. “When I think of corals, I immediately picture Australia. I had no idea such beautiful species were also present here in Europe!” - said one of the visitors, referring to the Yellow Gorgonian ( Eunicella cavolini), a common species in the Mediterranean Sea classified as “Near Threatened” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).   Another case that surprised the visitors was the charismatic and critically endangered European mink ( Mustela lutreola ). Once widespread in Europe, its range has suffered a drastic reduction by over 85% since the mid-19th century due to habitat loss and illegal hunting. Only a few fragmented populations still exist and its genome, sequenced as part of the ERGA Pilot project, will bring insights that can support and guide management and conservation actions. The Yellow Gorgonian coral, the Spanish moon moth and European White Elm illustrate the broad diversity of species sequenced by BGE and ERGA.  Photos: albert kok, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons ;  Banco de imágenes del CNICE - MEC, CC BY-SA 2.5 ES, via Wikimedia Commons; Christian Fischer, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons. Many other fascinating species captivated the audience, such as the smallest bat species found in Europe ( Pipistrellus hanaki), the beautiful Spanish Moon moth ( Graellsia isabellae ), and the gigantic European White Elm . The   Long Night of Science offered a great opportunity to reach out to citizens and tell them a bit about what we do at BGE and ERGA and why. Science communication events like this one are a rewarding two-way street, allowing us to learn from each other and gather diverse perspectives that guide us forward as a community of researchers, advancing and advocating for the development of biodiversity genomics in Europe. We thank everyone who stopped by our stand and the organisers of this year’s Long Night of Science and look forward to participating again next year! — About I’m Luísa Marins, and I coordinate communication actions for the European Reference Genome Atlas. If you want to know more about this event or the game, or if you would like help organizing a similar stand or any ERGA/BGE outreach activity across Europe, please reach out to media@erga-biodiversity.eu . References https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/50012182/50606230 https://www.berlin.de/en/events/2096550-2842498-long-night-of-the-sciences.en.html https://globalconservation.org/endangered-species/european-mink