Tracking epidemics with Nextstrain

About this Class

The emergence of SARS-CoV-2 in China has driven an enormous global effort to contribute and share genomic data in order to inform local authorities and the international community about key aspects of the outbreak. Analyses of these data have played an important role in tracking the epidemiology and evolution of the virus in real-time. Nextstrain (nextstrain.org) is an open science initiative to harness the scientific and public health potential of pathogen genome data, and has previously provided key insight into outbreaks of Ebola and Zika, and longer-term pathogen spread of Influenza and Enterovirus. This initiative provides a continually-updated view of publicly available data alongside powerful analytic and visualization tools for use by the community. Drs. Hodcroft and Hadfield, along with other members of the Nextstrain team, have been maintaining an up-to-date analysis of SARS-CoV-2 at nextstrain.org/ncov since January 20th 2020. This talk will provide an overview of Nextstrain and how it embodies ‘FAIR’ principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable), as well as outlining what insights Nextstrain has provided about the COVID-19 outbreak via genomic data sharing from around the world. https://nextstrain.org/