MULTICELLGENOMERETURN TO HOME ↙

THE MISSING RELATIVES

Known by their DNA.
Waiting to be seen.

Eleven environmental lineages. Some span oceans. Others hide in cold lakes or soils. Each may change the story of animal origins.

Explore the lineages↓

KNOWN UNKNOWNS

The sequence
came first.

Environmental DNA reveals branches of the tree before we know what the organisms look like, how they live or what they can do.

Our aim is to turn molecular traces into living biology.

Without representatives from entire lineages, any reconstruction of the ancestor of animals remains incomplete. Each lineage brought into view adds an independent piece of evidence about the biology from which animals evolved.

THE MAGNIFICENT EIGHT

A search for the
unseen branches.

Iñaki Ruiz-Trillo introduces the environmental lineages that could transform how we reconstruct the unicellular ancestry of animals.

FROM DNA TO CULTURE

01Detect
02Visualize
03Isolate
04Culture
05Sequence
06Experiment

FROM LANDSCAPE TO LINEAGE

The search begins
in the water.

We sample lakes, seas, sediments and soils to find molecular traces of organisms no one has yet seen.

Field sampling · Multicellgenome Lab · 2024

THE LINEAGE EXPLORER

Eleven traces
across the tree.

Select a lineage to see what is known — and, just as importantly, what remains unknown.

Marine opisthokont 2Possible sister group to choanoflagellates

From an environmental sequence to a living culture.

MAOP2 is present in multiple oceans and may represent the sister group to choanoflagellates. Environmental surveys also recover it from marine and terrestrial sediments. It is a decisive proof of principle for the journey from DNA detection to organismal study.

Environment
Marine
Distribution
Multiple oceans · marine and terrestrial sediments
Abundance
Abundant in sediments
DNA detectedIsolatedCultured

THE ATLAS — NEXT

Every organism
has a place.

The next layer will connect each published occurrence to its location, environment, campaign and evidence. No invented points — only traceable observations.

Open the interactive atlas ↗
Global atlas of missing unicellular relatives, awaiting verified occurrence data

ONE PROOF OF PRINCIPLE

MAOP2 moved
from DNA to culture.

One missing relative is no longer only a sequence. Its story will become the first complete journey in this portal.

Return to the homepage ↗