eDNA Initiative Granted EUR78.5m to Develop Resilient Crops

The Novo Nordisk Foundation and the Wellcome Trust have awarded a grant to AEGIS of up to EUR78.5m over seven years to AEGIS, a pioneering research project that harnesses environmental DNA (‘eDNA’), sets out to transform future global cropping systems and to develop resilient crops in the face of climate change. 

AEGIS is led by the evolutionary geneticist Professor Eske Willerslev from the University of Copenhagen and University of Cambridge. The initiative aims to decode and understand how ecosystems and crops have responded and adapted to past environmental perturbations and is driven by the aspiration to create a more sustainable future by enhancing crop resilience and agroecosystem sustainability.  

“Understanding how entire ecosystems and individual species function and have adapted to environmental challenges over the course of millennia will enable the creation of new resilient crops that can withstand and mitigate climate change. AEGIS has the potential to break scientific barriers in a number of fields, while simultaneously revolutionizing plant breeding and increasing the resilience of agroecosystems in both the Global South and Global North.” says Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, CEO, Novo Nordisk Foundation.

“Agricultural systems and the foods we grow have changed over millennia. We currently know very little about past ecosystems and what changes in biodiversity might have occurred as the environment changed. AEGIS hopes to build the evidence base needed to strengthen the resilience of food systems across the world in the face of future environmental changes,” elaborated John-Arne Røttingen, CEO, Wellcome Trust.  

“By employing ecosystem modeling, we can pinpoint which combinations of species led to the most durable ecosystems in the past. This knowledge could serve as a blueprint for creating climate resilient food systems, enhancing both the crops we grow and the sustainability of the environments they grow in,” explained Professor Eske Willerslev.  

As a part of the initiative, a global hub of environmental genomics expertise will be established at the University of Copenhagen. Central to this hub is the data engine, a core unit dedicated to extracting and analyzing ancient eDNA from sediment cores, offering a window into the Earth’s agrarian history and the response of ecosystems to changes over hundreds to millions of years. 

This groundbreaking work will harness the collective expertise in bioinformatics, microbial ecology, plant breeding, and environmental genomics to move scientific frontiers and develop new approaches to designing stable and resilient agroecosystems. The ultimate goal is to provide a robust knowledge base and tools for the global community to advance agriculture in the face of climatic adversity. 

The Novo Nordisk Foundation anticipates that AEGIS will significantly contribute to the understanding of agroecosystem functionalities from past environmental disturbances and will demonstrate proof-of-concept in key crops such as barley, wheat, and rice.  

AEGIS is committed to the principles of the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit Sharing, which focuses on fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising by the utilization of genetic resources, thereby contributing to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity.