The World Federation of Culture Collections and the World Data Center for Microorganisms (wdcm) initiated an international community-led project to sequence and annotate newly described prokaryotic taxa. This sequencing project aims to cooperate with international culture collections and the International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology and contribute to the expansion of whole genome sequencing databases for type strains. It will provide global microbial taxonomists with free standard genome sequencing and annotation services. Taxonomists are encouraged to contact the wdcm and participant culture collections to submit a type strain sequencing proposal.
Keywords: culture collections; genome sequencing; prokaryote; type strain.