Abstracts of Dr. Mary Edward's talks

3:30 pm Thursday, April 23, 2009; 401 IARC

Climate change and wildfire: a long-term perspective

3:30 pm Friday, April 24, 2009; Elvey Auditorium

A novel approach to the description of past and present arctic plant communities using DNA barcoding techniques

The potential of ancient DNA (aDNA) to inform palaeo studies has recently been investigated in a number of contexts.  I will discuss a novel approach that uses short-sequence barcoding and high-throughput sequencing to characterize aDNA present in modern and ancient sediments—specifically arctic soils and Quaternary sediments in permafrost terrain. The work builds upon pioneering work by Willerslev and Taberlet on aDNA extraction and barcoding and is part of an ongoing EU project ‘Ecochange’.  Over 800 species of arctic vascular plant have been catalogued and a barcode taxonomy has been developed. Last year we retrieved recent and sub-recent DNA from soils underlying tundra vegetation in Norway, and compared the DNA assemblages with modern vegetation cover. The results are promising and the method performs as well as pollen analysis.  Future developments promise to increase taxonomic resolution and expand the technique to other groups of organisms.  Rapidly advancing sequencing technology will make such an approach cost-effective as a rapid survey tool and a new palaeoecological technique, although some sediment archives impose temporal limitations on palaeo-reconstructions.