The Genomics in Biodiversity Conservation (Vertebrates and Invertebrates)

Dear Colleagues,

Biodiversity is declining at an unprecedented rate due to habitat loss, climate change, pollution, biological invasions, and overexploitation, making genome-informed biodiversity assessment and evidence-based conservation global priorities. Rapid advances in high-throughput sequencing, environmental DNA (eDNA), mitogenomics, phylogenomics, population genomics, long-read sequencing, genome assembly, comparative genomics, and artificial intelligence-assisted bioinformatics are transforming our ability to characterize biodiversity, resolve evolutionary relationships, monitor threatened populations, and develop data-driven conservation strategies. These technological innovations are also laying the foundation for emerging fields such as genomic rescue, evolutionary resilience, species restoration, and de-extinction initiatives. Despite these remarkable advances, major challenges remain, including limited genomic resources for non-model organisms, inconsistent methodological standards, insufficient integration of field and laboratory workflows, and the need for reproducible analytical pipelines that bridge genomics, ecology, evolution, and conservation biology. The proposed collection, "The Genomics in Biodiversity Conservation (Vertebrates and Invertebrates)," aims to showcase high-quality original research articles, comprehensive reviews, and visualized experimental protocols covering molecular systematics, biodiversity genomics, conservation genetics, phylogenomics, molecular ecology, environmental DNA, genome sequencing, genome assembly and annotation, biodiversity monitoring, and advanced bioinformatic analyses. Particular emphasis will be placed on standardized field sampling, specimen vouchering, molecular laboratory procedures, sequencing workflows, data quality control, and transparent computational pipelines that enhance reproducibility and facilitate cross-study comparisons. By providing peer-reviewed and step-by-step visual methodologies, this collection will serve as a valuable resource for researchers, educators, students, conservation practitioners, biotechnology scientists, and policymakers. It will accelerate the adoption of cutting-edge genomic technologies for biodiversity discovery, evolutionary research, and conservation planning, while fostering interdisciplinary collaboration among molecular biologists, ecologists, evolutionary biologists, computational scientists, and conservation professionals. Ultimately, this collection will promote reproducible, genome-enabled biodiversity science and strengthen the application of genomic evidence to conservation decision-making, sustainable ecosystem management, and innovative conservation solutions for safeguarding Earth's biological heritage in an era of rapid environmental change.

In this Special Issue, we propose a collection of works exploring the potential applications of genetics and genomics to biomolecules in the study of vertebrates and invertebrates. 

Both research (in particular) and review articles proposing novelties or overviews, respectively, are welcome.

Dr. Shantanu Kundu
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Biomolecules is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• aquatic genomics
• biodiversity monitoring
• comparative genomics
• conservation genetics
• DNA metabarcoding
• environmental DNA
• evolutionary genomics
• genome-wide study
• landscape genetics
• metagenomics
• mitogenomics
• molecular ecology
• molecular systematics
• museum genomics
• phylogenetics
• phylogenomics
• population genetics
• precision conservation
• threatened and endemic species
• transcriptomics
• whole-genome sequencing
• wildlife genomics