Scaling microbial metagenomic datasets (Basecamp Research)

I think this startup is interesting! This is not a sponsored post, not meant to be anyone’s opinion other than my own, and is not investment advice. Here is some more information about why I write about startups at all.

“Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.”

I always think about this quote whenever I think about microbes — a general term used to refer to bacteria, fungi, and viruses.

The genetic space that microbes occupy, often referred to as metagenomics, is large. A handful of soil alone contains trillions of microbes. They permeate every corner of the Earth, from sea mud in the Mariana Trench to t he lower stratosphere. Each one adapts to the environments they reside in, slowly modifying itself to best survive.

While many species have been residents of their native environment for eons, they do not stay static in response to environment changes. The fast growth rates of many microbes afford it the ability to pass through selective pressures extraordinarily quickly. Just a year after the Chernoybl meltdown disaster in 1986, radioactive-resistant fungi was discovered within 30 kilometers of the power plant. The vast number of microbes along with their associated mutation rate make it, without question, the single largest source of biodiversity on our planet.

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