The Genomic Opportunities Lab's Partnership Program

Through an Innovative Financial Model, GenOps is Partnering to Provide Deeply Discounted Dietary DNA Metabarcoding Data to Help Remove Cost as a Barrier to Better Outcomes in Ecology & Conservation

What this Program Offers

​The GenOps Partnership Program provides conservation organizations, government agencies, and researchers with high-quality dietary DNA metabarcoding data at a steep discount compared to standard commercial rates. Each cycle, we will select a limited cohort of partners to benefit from fixed-scope project data—helping with sample processing through sequencing, bioinformatics, and a final diet composition report. This collaborative approach amplifies and extends the kinds of conservation impacts that underpin all of our lab's programs at Brown University. 

Why this Program Exists

Dietary DNA metabarcoding can answer some of the most pressing questions in wildlife ecology, conservation, and management: what animals are eating, how diets shift across seasons or habitats, how invasive species affect food webs, and how to resolve human–wildlife conflict. But commercial-rate sequencing companies often price data at levels that position these kinds of insights beyond what the researchers and organizations that are doing the most consequential work for conservation can afford.
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The Kartzinel Lab at Brown University launched the GenOps Partnership Program to close that gap. We are pursuing creative financing opportunities that enable us to offer a limited number of deeply discounted partnerships in each cycle. We aim to support projects that have a high potential for impact but that might otherwise go unfunded. We are committed to doing this without compromising on scientific rigor or quality standards.

How the Partnership Program Works

Each cycle, GenOps opens a competitive application window and selects a small cohort of partners (typically 3–5 per year). This is a partnership in every sense of the word. We have designed the program to better accommodate the timelines of both practitioners and researchers, inviting applications for either a faster, smaller-scale 'Rapid Track' or a larger-scale 'Standard Track'—both at rates substantially below typical commercial pricing. Because demand for this program exceeds our capacity, we run it as a scheduled, recurring call rather than accepting rolling requests. This is how we can guarantee the turnaround times and quality controls that every selected partner deserves. We aim to prioritize projects based on their potential immediate or long-term impact on conservation and management, while also considering sampling feasibility, partner commitment, and broader scientific or public value.

​Projects that fall outside this program's scope or timeline are still welcome to engage with us! Through GenOps, we support general collaborative contracting that is generally more affordable than what is commercially available. We also engage in field/lab visits to co-develop protocols and provide training.

Current Cohort & Opportunities

2026–2027 Cohort — Applications open September 14th; due November 1, 2026

Questions? Please contact Dr. Tyler Kartzinel for info.

Follow us on Instagram to know when application cycles open, or check back on this page anytime​

Call for proposals:
***​The 2026-27 program will open September 14th 2026***

Not able to partner? Consider a donation to help expand what's possible in the genomics age

About GenOps

​The Genomic Opportunities Lab (GenOps) is an initiative of the Kartzinel Lab at Brown University. The Kartzinel Lab has developed and refined the dietary DNA metabarcoding methods used in this program based on years of published, peer-reviewed research involving diverse ecological systems, in consultation with a wide array of conservation and management partners from around the world. Brown University hosts the program's administrative and contractual infrastructure, ensuring that every partnership is executed reliably and in compliance with institutional requirements.

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