Global Impact Awards support organizations using technology and innovative approaches to tackle some of the world’s toughest human challenges. We look for nimble, entrepreneurial organizations that have a specific project that tests a big idea and a brilliant team with a healthy disregard for the impossible. From real-time sensors that monitor clean water to DNA barcoding that stops wildlife trafficking, our first round of awards provides $23 million to seven organizations changing the world.
Consortium for the Barcode of Life
DNA barcodes to safeguard endangered species
Project:
The Smithsonian Institution’s Consortium for the Barcode of Life (CBOL) will use
its $3 million Impact Awards grant to create and begin implementing ‘DNA barcoding’
as an actionable tool for protecting the world’s most endangered wildlife. Working
with researchers in six developing countries, CBOL will build a public library of
DNA barcodes that law enforcement officials can use to identify confiscated
material.
Impact:
More than 35,000 of the world’s 1.8 million named species are considered to be in
danger of extinction, either regionally or globally. Of these, 2,000 are protected
from illegal international trade by the strictest trade regulations under a UN
treaty. Intercepting wildlife as they are transferred across borders and
prosecuting traffickers are critical to slowing illegal trade, but current
detection tools are too slow, unreliable, and either too expensive or simply
unavailable to developing countries where most protected species live. DNA
barcoding is a cost-effective, rapid, standardized approach that can identify
species by matching short DNA sequences in a global database. The Consortium for
the Barcode of Life will work with researchers to assemble the database and will
train enforcement officials to use this technology to disrupt illegal trade.
Apple Needs to Make it in America
