Tree of Life; A Digital Version of Existence

Scientists from eleven scientific institutions have successfully digitized the genetic map of 2.3 million different biological species, including animals, plants, fungi, and microbes. They named this digital map the 'Tree of Life.' According to these researchers, this tree is an 'open classification' of thousands of other maps (trees) created by scientists over the past few centuries. This tree is considered an 'open source' resource, meaning anyone can edit it at the provided electronic address. According to the Christian Science Monitor, this map resembles a kaleidoscopic image of towers with a spectrum of rainbow colors, showcasing the latest digital version of the life chart on Earth from its inception. The lifespan of the biological species in this chart dates back to three and a half billion years ago. Since scientists believe that all biological species on Earth have a common origin, understanding how millions of life forms are related will help them not only find better agricultural methods but also gain a better understanding of microbes and viruses. Karen Cranston, the senior researcher of this study and a biological phylogenetics specialist at Duke University, states that there is a significant gap between what scientists know about the relationships among living beings and what is currently available digitally. Most life maps found in the field of biological phylogenetics exist in paper versions and are of poor quality for printing in books. 'Twenty-five years ago, they said achieving this goal (digitizing all known life samples) was impossible,' says Dr. Douglas Solit, a genetics professor at the University of Florida, adding that the Tree of Life project is just the beginning of further research in the future. Writing computer codes and compiling existing data for this project took three years. Cody Hinchliffe from Idaho State University mentions that 'many individuals and institutions spent hundreds of hours to realize this project, collecting thousands of existing maps from various books and selecting 484 samples from these maps (trees of life) to form the first initial version of this digital tree.' To achieve this goal, the academic team developed its own software and algorithms. So far, scientists have named 1.8 million biological species, but only 22% of them have genetic maps.