Wildlife archives (bone pathology and macroparasites) at Aberystwyth University (School of Veterinary Science) will be used as references to identify pathological specimens in zooarchaeological and museum assemblages. Bioinformatic methods (e.g. 6) will be used to molecularly identify the presence of parasites in publicly available whole genome sequencing data, and newly generated shotgun sequencing data, and from the reference and ancient faunal remains. Overlap will be assessed between the reference and ancient datasets, and the morphological and molecular approaches will be compared to assess Type I and Type II error. We will use contextual information and 14C dating to identify the first occurrence of any parasite DNA identified. The project will focus on large- and medium-bodied mammals from archaeological archives and museum collections (including Cardiff Archaeology and the NHM, London), dating from the Holocene (c. 11.7 KYA) until the present-day. Ancient molecular lab work will be carried out at the newly formed Cardiff University ancient DNA (CUAD) laboratory.
Plus d’informations :
[Website Cardiff University]