biology · environment · manufacturing · health · family: the answer is in a field you’ve never heard of
millionsofyearsofr&d,goingextinct
Evolution's solutions are being lost before we can decode them
Problem statement
Over the history of life on Earth, organisms have repeatedly evolved innovative adaptive traits in response to diverse biotic and abiotic pressures, but most of these functional solutions remain poorly understood for the vast majority of species. That is so despite explosive growth in high-quality reference genomes and in computational methods. At the same time, high global extinction rates and the loss of biodiversity that follows threaten the opportunity to discover, understand, and use these evolved solutions. Cultural and intellectual gaps divide some biological subdisciplines, such as molecular and cell biology on one side and systematics and evolutionary biology on the other, and the source sees a critical need for lasting collaborations between biologists doing fundamental research and those who could put discoveries to use, including engineers.
Why this matters
Biological innovations hold significant potential for applications in the bioeconomy, including industrial processes, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, energy production, and nature-based solutions to climate change (the list in the letter as published in January 2024; the page as revised in January 2026 gives a shorter one, see Source Notes). Executive Order 14081 directed federal agencies to leverage biological discoveries for a sustainable, safe, and secure American bioeconomy. Convergent evolution, where analogous traits arise independently in separate lineages, often in response to similar selective pressures, provides a comparative framework for exploring the origins and mechanisms of life's innovations. High extinction rates threaten the chance to find and use these solutions.
What’s been tried and why it hasn’t worked
The source is a short funding letter and does not review earlier attempts. What it does say is that the growth of genomic resources, organismal and phylogenetic knowledge, and computational capabilities has not been enough on its own: most of life's functional solutions remain poorly understood for the vast majority of species. It lists the application of generative AI to protein structural modeling and the extended research utility of biological collections among the recent advances that make the work possible now, not as failures. It names the obstacle as cultural and intellectual gaps that currently divide some biological subdisciplines, and a need for collaborations, training, and partnerships that reach scientists in other fields such as engineers, computer scientists, and chemists.
What would unlock progress
The source encourages comparative approaches that identify evolutionary convergent adaptations and the mechanisms that underlie them, studied at several biological levels (molecular, organismal, phylogenetic); stronger computational tools and resources (it names biobanks, databases, and algorithms); research collaborations and training that cross the silos between molecular and cellular biology, biochemistry, organismal biology, systematics, and evolutionary biology; and sustainable partnerships between biologists doing fundamental research and those working to apply discoveries, in engineering, agriculture, and industry among other fields.
Entry points for student teams
A student team could select a specific engineering challenge (e.g., anti-fouling surfaces, freeze tolerance, or UV resistance) and use publicly available genomic databases (NCBI, UniProt) and phylogenetic tools to identify convergent evolution events across distantly related species, then characterize the candidate genes and proteins computationally. This is feasible as a bioinformatics project using existing databases and open-source tools. A team with wet-lab access could experimentally characterize a candidate protein identified through this pipeline.
Genes
Structural cousins: stuck the same way, in other fields
Sources
"Leveraging Innovations From Evolution (LIFE)," NSF BIO Directorate DCL, NSF 24-049. (accessed 2026-02-10). go to source ↗
Working notes
Notes made while writing and checking this brief, shown as written. They use working shorthand.
- The LIFE DCL directs proposals to the core solicitations of three BIO divisions (Division of Environmental Biology, Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences, and Division of Integrative Organismal Systems), to the Integrative Research in Biology track, and to the Infrastructure Innovation for Biological Research program; its points of contact come from four divisions, including the Division of Biological Infrastructure.
- Cross-domain connection: this brief shares structure with the chemical sensor field deployment problem (both involve bridging laboratory capabilities to real-world application) and with the critical minerals extraction problem (both involve discovering natural processes that could be engineered).
- The convergent evolution approach rests on independent replication, analogous traits arising independently in separate lineages; the source calls this comparative framework "valuable for robustly exploring the origins, mechanisms, and macro-evolution of life's innovations."
- Related databases: the Earth BioGenome Project aims to sequence all known eukaryotic species, potentially providing raw material for the comparative work described here.
- The source gives no figure for extinction rates; it says only that "high global extinction rates and the consequent loss of biodiversity" threaten the opportunity to discover, understand, and capitalize on these evolved solutions.
- The letter was revised after publication. The version published January 17, 2024, and still served at the Source-line address in December 2024 (archived copy: web.archive.org/web/20240614030034/www.nsf.gov/pubs/2024/nsf24049/nsf24049.jsp) names Executive Order 14081 and lists energy production and nature-based solutions to climate change among bioeconomy applications; the page as it stands on nsf.gov, marked archived and last updated January 23, 2026, carries neither passage. The body follows the published version on those two points.
Reconciliation 2026-10-01: Fact repair after reading the whole write-up against its source, with a second reader going over the repairs on the same day. The source, NSF Dear Colleague Letter 24-049, was fetched on 2026-10-01 and read in full; the link on the Source line now redirects to https://www.nsf.gov/funding/opportunities/dcl-leveraging-innovations-evolution-life/nsf24-049, where the letter is marked as archived (last updated January 23, 2026). The second reader also read the letter as published, from the Internet Archive copy of the Source-line address (June and December 2024); the two versions differ in one paragraph, noted in the bullet above. Executive Order 14081, which the write-up names, was read in full from the Federal Register (87 FR 56849, https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/09/15/2022-20167/advancing-biotechnology-and-biomanufacturing-innovation-for-a-sustainable-safe-and-secure-american), and the Earth BioGenome Project's home page (https://www.earthbiogenome.org/) was read for its stated aim. The letter is about 800 words, and much of the earlier text went beyond it. (1) The Display title changed from "Four Billion Years of R&D, Going Extinct" to "Millions of Years of R&D, Going Extinct", and "Over billions of years" in the Problem Statement became "Over the history of life on Earth". The letter speaks of "millions of years of evolution" and "the history of life on Earth"; it gives no figure in billions. (2) The list of evolved solutions (corrosion resistance, energy-efficient locomotion, drought tolerance, pathogen defense, carbon fixation, self-healing materials) is not in the letter and was removed. The letter says organisms have repeatedly evolved innovative adaptive traits and that most of life's functional solutions remain poorly understood for the vast majority of species; the text now says that, and "undiscovered" and "unknown" became "poorly understood". (3) The text said extinction is "permanently destroying these biological innovations before they can be studied" and that every extinction "permanently closes a door". The letter says high global extinction rates and the consequent loss of biodiversity threaten the opportunity to discover, understand, and capitalize on these solutions; both sentences now say that. (4) The text said a "fundamental disciplinary gap" separates molecular biologists from evolutionary biologists and that neither group "routinely connects with engineers". The letter says cultural and intellectual gaps divide some biological subdisciplines and that there is a critical need for collaborations with applied scientists, engineers among them; the sentence now follows the letter. (5) The text said the bioeconomy "depends on" understanding biological innovations. The letter says the innovations "hold significant potential for applications in the bioeconomy"; the verb was softened. The list (industrial processes, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, energy production, nature-based solutions to climate change) is confirmed in the letter as published in January 2024 and was kept; the page as revised in January 2026 lists only industrial processes, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and other nature-based solutions, and the sentence now says which version it follows. (6) The sentence on Executive Order 14081 was first rewritten from the order itself because the live page does not mention the order; the second reader found the passage in the letter as published ("In Executive Order 14081 ... the White House directed federal agencies to foster innovative solutions ... through the use of new data, predictive models, and products gleaned from discoveries originating from the study of diverse organisms across the tree of life") and restored the original sentence unchanged. (7) "Vastly underutilized", said of the comparative approach, is not in the letter, which speaks of its "expanding application"; the phrase was removed, and the definition of convergent evolution now uses the letter's wording (separate lineages, not "unrelated species"). (8) The section on what has been tried rested on claims the letter does not make: that biomimicry studies single organisms in isolation; that AlphaFold is disconnected from ecological context (the letter does not name AlphaFold and lists generative AI for protein structural modeling as an advance); that collections lack metadata and computational infrastructure (the letter lists the extended research utility of collections as an advance); and "decades of calls for interdisciplinary work". These were removed, and the section now says what the letter does say. (9) The unlock section listed pipelines that scan genomes for engineering challenges and methods that characterize innovations "without needing to culture the organism"; neither is in the letter. The section now lists what the letter encourages. (10) In the notes above, the statement that the letter "spans three BIO divisions" was corrected: it points to core solicitations in three divisions and also to the Infrastructure Innovation for Biological Research program, and its contacts come from four divisions. (11) The claim that a solution reached by several lineages "is likely robust and generalizable" is not in the letter and was replaced by the letter's own sentence on the comparative framework; "natural replication" became "independent replication" (the letter's phrase is "independently replicated"). (12) "Current extinction rates are estimated at 100-1000x the background rate" is not in the letter, which gives no figure, and the phrase "race between extinction and discovery", which stood in quotation marks, does not appear in it either; both were removed and the note now quotes the letter. Confirmed in the source and left as written: the Source line (title, NSF 24-049, BIO Directorate); the explosive growth of genomic resources and computational tools; the three division names. The Earth BioGenome Project's page states its aim as sequencing the genomes of "all of Earth's eukaryotic biodiversity", which supports the note above. The entry points are suggestions of this write-up and are not in the letter; NCBI and UniProt both opened without a login on 2026-10-01. Not changed: the long title, which carries no number, though the letter says only that extinction threatens the opportunity to decode these solutions. Genome tags untouched.