We are excited to announce the 2025 NeLLi (New Lineages of Life) Symposium taking place at the Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art at UNLV, Nov. 4-5, 2025, organized by UNLV and DRI in cooperation with the Department of Energy's Joint Genome Institute.

On Nov. 4, a poster session will be hosted at the National Atomic Testing Museum in partnership with the Desert Research Institute.

This symposium will spotlight exciting discoveries that are reshaping our view of microbial diversity. Advances in DNA sequencing are revealing entirely new branches of life, raising challenges in how to classify this diversity, connect sequences to function, and move from data to discovery.

Throughout the symposium, leading researchers from around the world will share computational and experimental approaches for exploring these new lineages and their potential impact in bioenergy, biomedicine, and biotechnology.

Registration is now open. Abstracts are due Sunday, Oct. 19, 2025.

Immediately following the Symposium, a 1.5-day jamboree (Nov. 6-7, 2025) will focus on improving cultivation and genomic coverage.