Recovery and identification of missing servicemen

By Jeremy Austin

As we approach the commemoration of ANZAC Day, we are reminded of the more than 25,000 Australian servicemen missing in action who have yet to be recovered and identified. On the 17th June 1917, British and Australian forces launched an offensive against German lines at Messines in Belgium.  Made famous by the film “Beneath Hill 60” , the Battle of Messines  was one of the most successful campaigns by the Allies on the Western Front during World War 1. However, success came at a terrible price with more than 13,500 Australian casualties.

Advertisement

The source of the genetics: searching for the remains of the world’s large land mammals.

By Laura S. Weyrich

Our ancient animal, human, plant, and even bacterial samples are obtained from around the world and, though we conduct much of our work in ACAD’s ancient DNA laboratories, we do get the chance to visit some of the amazing places where ancient DNA may be lurking. One of Alan Cooper’s key interests is the extinction of the world’s megafauna (i.e. the super large mammals that roamed the planet thousands of years ago). Recently, Alan and several of his American collaborators were successful in a National Science Foundation grant to excavate Natural Trap Cave, in Wyoming, USA, to obtain megafaunal bones of extinct animals

The power of Dental Calculus – Tedx

Professor Alan Cooper, head of ACAD, gave a Tedx talk here at the University of Adelaide on our teeth and why we should care about the bacteria on them. Watch it here.

Research Talks 11th – 13th November, 2013

As part of the Advanced Bioinformatics Early Career Researcher workshop, ACAD is hosting three experts in the fields of genomics, metagenomics, population genetics and bioinformatics.  These tutors will present talks on their research, as part of the week’s program, that are open to the public.  Interested folk welcome.

Monday 11th 5pm, ‘Middle Pleistocene-omics: Sequencing really ancient genomes and proteomes’ by Ludovic Orlando, Center for GeoGenetics, Copenhagen

Tuesday 12th 5pm, ‘Tracing prehistoric human migration patterns, using genetic data’ by Joe Pickrell, Harvard Medical School.

Wednesday 13th 5pm, ‘Metagenomic analyses and the era of Next Generation Sequencing – from the Human Microbiome Project to the Earth Microbiome Project’ by Rob Knight, University of Colorado.

All held in the Mawson Lecture Theatre, North Terrace Campus.