The current' insect apocalypse' is really a death by a thousand cuts, pesticide use, land use modification and climate change are likely the major factors causing these global insect declines and all of these are due to human activities. I think it is in our best interest to try to mitigate as many of these as we can since every species on the planet is important.

Corrie Moreau

Museomics is the use of museum collections for genome sequencing and other analytical techniques that could not even be imagined when the majority of museum specimens were collected, what makes this so groundbreaking is that we can address questions that can not be answered any other way. This study is a great example of this since we can not go out and collect the Xerces blue butterfly and the only way to address genetic questions about this species is by turning to museum collections.

It was nerve-wracking, because you want to protect as much of it as you can, taking the first steps and pulling off part of the abdomen was very stressful, but it was also kind of exhilarating to know that we might be able to address a question that has been unanswered for almost 100 years that can't be answered any other way.

Although I know there are some people interested in potentially resurrecting this species, I think we have a long way to go before we would be able to actually do this, it would require significant time and financial resources to not only recapitulate its genome, but also establish the required host plants for the larvae and native symbiotic ants. During this time of a global insect decline, I would prefer to see our resources put towards saving those species already endangered or protecting critical habitat.

As insects are critical for any ecosystem the loss of any one species has ripple effects through the community, as we can see from these examples above the interconnectedness of species from mutualists to food plants to habitat requirements can have huge impacts on the survival of a species. To be honest without insects our planet would become inhospitable to humans within a matter of months. We need insects even if we don't always realize it.

The Xerces blue butterfly was the first insect in United States that was documented to be driven to extinction by human activities.