The consulting firm participated in the 2019 edition of the Yunnan Metabarcoding School in China.
Biologist Carlos Santana was the representation of LITOCLEAN Peru at the 2019 edition of the Yunnan Metabarcoding School, held in Yunnan (China), an event in which about thirty researchers from around the world from various fields of research participated. LITOCLEAN participated invited by the Institute of Zoology of Kunming University and with the support of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Metabarcoding is a scientific discipline that conducts biodiversity studies by analyzing the molecules of life: RNA and DNA. One of the most interesting lines of research is that of environmental DNA (eDNA), which seeks to characterize and analyze the biodiversity of a site of interest by analyzing the DNA and RNA present in soil, water, sediments, air, feces, etc. Metabarcoding is fueled by advances in cybernetics, biotechnology and machine learning.
The first part of the workshop dealt with technical aspects of sampling, extraction, sequencing and identification of taxa. The second part dealt with statistical analysis of results and decision making tools. LITOCLEAN took advantage of its attendance to talk about the potential uses of this technology in the management of contaminated sites and, in general, in the evaluation and mitigation of the impacts caused by projects on biodiversity and ecosystems.