Ship wrecks can act as repositories of plant matter.
When we think about shipwreck discoveries, we often picture coins, porcelain, or other artifacts as the most valuable finds. Yet in favorable conditions, such as the cold waters of the Baltic Sea, even fragile plant remains can survive for centuries, or in some cases even thousands of years.
With modern genetic methods, these preserved plants open a window into the past. Many of the species found in wreck cargoes are still important crops today. By studying their ancient DNA, we can explore how cultivation has shaped the crops we rely on now. This research helps us understand what has been lost in the domestication process and could even guide the development of better crop varieties for the future.
Coffea arabica
The study focuses on Coffea arabica samples recovered from shipwrecks as a case study. The samples are sequenced and through genetic analyses, we will shed light on 18th- and 19th-century coffee culture and genetical histrory of C. arabica.
The genetic analysis investigates the evolutionary history of modern C. arabica cultivation by comparing the wreck samples to contemporary cultivars. The question is what was lost in the cultivation process due to genomic erosion and how deleterious alleles accumulated to the modern cultivars during this process?
Coffee leaf rust
First recorded epidemic of Hemileia vastatrix was in srilanka (Ceylon) in 1868 and the studied wrecks predate this event. We want to study how the resistance genes of wreck beans differ to modern variates. Perhaps we can find lost diversity that will help to produce more resilient variants in the future!
Contacts
Researcher
Eero Saarinen linktr.ee/coffee_wrecks
