Expeditionlab arises from a collaboration among the Department of Tropical Biodiversity of the MUSE – Museum of Science of Trento (IT), the Department of Biotechnology of the University of Verona (IT) and Personal Genomics.
The term ‘Expedition’ has been chosen because what we do since more than two decades is addressed towards the tropical regions of the world, in particular the Eastern Afromontane in Africa in collaboration with WCS – Wildlife Conservation Society. This resulted in a unique collection of amphibians and reptiles kept at MUSE that we are aiming to share through a dedicated open database that will be soon accessible on-line.
A lot of work has been done on the specimens of this collection, from morphological research to genetic identification with more than 60 new species described. To date, this work has been carried out in Europe: all the specimens examined were brought to MUSE from Africa for morphological analyses and to Switzerland for genetics, with a few related problems, in particular linked to specimens’ transportation and conservation and to research permits and documentation.
This is the reason why the term ‘Lab’ has been included in our project. In fact, our aim is to develop an efficient laboratorial equipment that can be carried around and used to conduct research from A to Z directly into the field in the remotest hotspot regions of the world.
This project has already brought to the creation of the kit called ‘Gene’, tested in April/May 2015 in Tanzania. On that occasion, the team was able to attribute a frog caught in the forest to the right species on the basis of genetic analyses carried out in a tent site.
For projects like ‘Gene’, the team embraces the DIY philosophy. Developing with the MUSE FabLab facility and using open-source hardware to build scientific equipment is a great opportunity to make science outside conventional laboratories, to get more people approaching science and to lower research costs and timing.
But that’s not all: the outcomes of Expeditionlab will be also easily accessible to everyone, highly shareable and reproducible even in countries where technologies and facilities are not well developed yet.
