A research paper by the group in which Dr. T. Katayama participated on detailed tracing of COVID-19 based on genomic information from a SARS-CoV-2 has been awarded GGS PRIZE 2024. The GGS PRIZE is awarded to one to three outstanding scientific papers published in Genes & Genetic Systems (GGS), a journal published by the Genetics Society of Japan.

In this study, the SARS-CoV-2 genome sequences and sampling information in the GISAID database were used to identify the ancestral haplotypes of the so-called second to fifth waves of the epidemic in Japan. A web platform “SARS-CoV-2 HaploGraph”; was developed to classify the haplotypes based on nucleotide variants in each genome sequence from the ancestral haplotypes and to view when and how long they were sampled in each prefecture.

The SARS-CoV-2 HaploGraph is available on the COVID-19 Data Portal JAPAN and its codes and statistics at the GitHub.

For more detail, please see the awarded paper:
S. Nakagawa, et al. SARS-CoV-2 HaploGraph: visualization of SARS-CoV-2 haplotype spread in Japan. Genes & Genetic Systems (2023) Nov 21;98(5):221-237. DOI: 10.1266/ggs.23-00085