Stronger-SAFE is a £3.9m Wellcome Trust funded project that will increase our understanding of how trachoma is transmitted, and hopefully lead to the development and testing of new, more effective interventions and treatment approaches. Professor Nick Thomson, from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), is part of the team that are using new DNA sequencing approaches to better understand how this disease is spread.

To commemorate the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute turning 25 in 2018, the Institute and its collaborators are sequencing 25 new genomes of species in the UK. The final five species have now been chosen by thousands of school children and members of the public around the globe, who participated in the 25 Genomes Project online vote.

Takeda is a global, research and development-driven pharmaceutical company with expertise in oncology, gastroenterology (GI) and central nervous system (CNS) disease that will complement the offerings of GSK, Biogen, the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and the European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI), and build on the initiative’s success.

The largest-ever genetic study of mosquitoes reveals the movement of insecticide resistance between different regions of Africa and finds several rapidly evolving insecticide resistance genes. Malaria is transmitted by mosquitoes and rising resistance to insecticides is hampering efforts to control the disease. Reported in Nature, this genetic resource will help to develop new tools for monitoring resistance and managing insecticide use, and for designing novel control methods.

A study has found an unexpected new drug target for acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) that could open new avenues to develop effective treatments against this potentially lethal disease. Researchers from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, the Gurdon Institute and their collaborators show that inhibiting the METTL3 gene destroys human and mouse AML cells without harming non-leukaemic blood cells.

In two new studies focussing on Africa and Latin America, scientists analysed historical cholera samples to trace their transmission across the globe. They found that cholera repeatedly traveled out of south Asia to cause epidemics in Africa and Latin America.

To commemorate the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute turning 25 in 2018, the Institute and collaborators are sequencing 25 new genomes. From the blackberry to the robin, bush cricket to brown trout, all the species reside in the UK. Twenty species have already been decided, and the remaining five will be voted for by the public and school children.

Professor Peacock uses whole genome sequencing technology in public health, helping to increase the speed of outbreak analysis. She has been working with local hospitals and regional microbiology services to implement sequence-based approaches to clinical microbiology. Her latest study showed that routine genomic surveillance of MRSA can detect unsuspected outbreaks.

Genomic surveillance has revealed the first complete picture of MRSA spread across the east of England. By tracking all MRSA-positive people in the area, researchers saw the transmission within and between hospitals, and in GPs surgeries and communities. The study showed that routine genomic surveillance could catch outbreaks earlier, which could help prevent further transmission.

In the largest study of its kind, five new malaria vaccine targets have been discovered by scientists at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and their collaborators. Researchers studied the malaria parasite at its most vulnerable stage – when invading human red blood cells – and identified five targets that lead to a reduction in the parasite’s ability to enter red blood cells.