All biological fields are facing drastic redefinition and improvement of baseline knowledge derived from the tremendous amount of information coming from genomics technologies. The sequencing of complete genomes represents a prerequisite for full exploitation of the massive information generated by high throughput platforms and new approaches. Sequenced genomes will benefit zoology at all levels and several projects have been already started in this direction.

The World Lagomorph Society, in its role of encouraging and supporting research activities and networks, considers such research a priority for all lagomorph species. While the cost and time required to generate a complete sequenced genome has become increasingly assessable to broader scientists, there still exists a great need for specialized experts to assemble and annotate these data. Thus, the World Lagomorph Society, in collaboration with the European funded COST Action (A Collaborative European Network on Rabbit Genome Biology - RGB-Net) will organize a meeting to develop an International Collaborative Consortium for the Sequencing of all Lagomorph Genomes to bring together different expertise, interested parties, and related projects to foster new research opportunities.

The meeting will be held 18-19 February, 2013 in Bologna (Italy), hosted by the Chair of RGB-Net (Prof. Luca Fontanesi) at the Faculty of Agriculture of the University of Bologna. RGB-Net can support a small number of attendants. All WLS members who would like to contribute (e.g., sampling, sequencing, data analysis, or with ideas and political strategies) are invited to attend the meeting and to contact the President of the WLS (Dr. Paulo Alves) as co-coordinator of this initiative. We hope this is a first step towards developing successful, strong, and diverse consortium to allow Lagmorpha to become the first mammalian order with all species sequenced. Please see the below links for further information.

http://www.cost.esf.org/domains_actions/bmbs/Actions/TD1101

http://www.biocomp.unibo.it/rabbit/