STAT+: Amid shakeup in U.S. science, researchers express alarm over integrity of key genetic databases

As the Trump administration exercises its influence on the U.S. scientific landscape, revising language on government websites for ideological reasons and disappearing agency databases, at least temporarily, some scientists are expressing increasing concerns about the safety and integrity of resources scientists around the world use daily: genetic sequence information.

Until recently, few would have questioned whether two tools, in particular — GenBank, the world’s largest repository of full genetic sequences, and the Sequence Read Archive, which comprises raw unassembled genetic sequence data — would ever be in jeopardy. These resources, whose centrality to the conduct of science cannot be overstated, researchers say, are housed in and maintained by the National Library of Medicine, a branch of the National Institutes of Health. 

A year ago, the NIH would have been widely viewed as a global bastion of science; it has been the biggest public funder of biomedical research in the world. But the Trump administration has signaled radical change is on the way; the scientific community is already reeling from word that the NIH will drastically cut a key portion of its grants that universities rely on to help cover their costs. Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency is likely to look for more cost savings still.   

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