Real-Time Genomic Surveillance: From Outbreak Detection to Public Health Action

Genomic surveillance has become an essential component of outbreak detection, transmission analysis, and public health decision-making. Advances in high-throughput, nanopore, wastewater, and point-of-care sequencing now allow viral genomes to be generated and analysed on increasingly short timescales. These data can identify emerging variants, reconstruct transmission pathways, estimate epidemic growth, and guide interventions. However, important barriers remain, including uneven sampling, delays in data sharing, limited analytical capacity, uncertain representativeness, and weak links between genomic findings and operational decisions. This Research Topic aims to examine the complete pathway from sample collection and sequencing to interpretation, communication, and public health action, with particular attention to implementation in low-resource settings. To gather further insights into real-time genomic surveillance, we welcome articles addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:o Wastewater, environmental, and clinical genomic surveillanceo Phylogenetic and phylodynamic outbreak analysiso Nanopore and point-of-care sequencingo Sampling design, representativeness, and quality assuranceo Automated pipelines, artificial intelligence, and data integrationo Genomic surveillance in low-resource and decentralised settingso Case studies linking genomic data to interventions or policyo Data sharing, ethics, governance, and public communication Topic editors: Aditya Gupta, Dimitrios Skliros Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/84690/real-time-genomic-surveillance-from-outbreak-detection-to-public-health-action