Savolainen Vincent, Cowan Robyn S, Vogler Alfried P, Roderick George K, Lane Richard
Jodrell Laboratory, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, Surrey TW9 3DS, UK.
Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2005 Oct 29;360(1462):1805-11. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2005.1730.
An international consortium of major natural history museums, herbaria and other organizations has launched an ambitious project, the 'Barcode of Life Initiative', to promote a process enabling the rapid and inexpensive identification of the estimated 10 million species on Earth. DNA barcoding is a diagnostic technique in which short DNA sequence(s) can be used for species identification. The first international scientific conference on Barcoding of Life was held at the Natural History Museum in London in February 2005, and here we review the scientific challenges discussed during this conference and in previous publications. Although still controversial, the scientific benefits of DNA barcoding include: (i) enabling species identification, including any life stage or fragment, (ii) facilitating species discoveries based on cluster analyses of gene sequences (e.g. cox1 = CO1, in animals), (iii) promoting development of handheld DNA sequencing technology that can be applied in the field for biodiversity inventories and (iv) providing insight into the diversity of life.
一个由大型自然历史博物馆、植物标本馆和其他组织组成的国际联盟发起了一项雄心勃勃的项目——“生命条形码计划”，以推动一个能够快速且低成本地识别地球上约1000万种物种的进程。DNA条形码是一种诊断技术，其中短DNA序列可用于物种识别。2005年2月，首届生命条形码国际科学会议在伦敦自然历史博物馆举行，在此我们回顾了本次会议以及以往出版物中讨论的科学挑战。尽管仍存在争议，但DNA条形码的科学益处包括：（i）能够识别物种，包括任何生命阶段或片段；（ii）基于基因序列的聚类分析（如动物中的cox1 = CO1）促进物种发现；（iii）推动可应用于野外生物多样性清查的手持式DNA测序技术的发展；（iv）深入了解生命的多样性。
