Tracking ancestry, hair samples and crime scenes – that’s likely what you think of when you hear DNA. Probably not fish mucus and kangaroo scat.
That’s environmental DNA – or eDNA – and ecologists can now track it to find out what animals and organisms have been where.
But human eDNA could be collected just as easily, and some experts are concerned about whether it could be used in nefarious ways.
Dr Sophie Calabretto talks to Cosmos Magazine science journalist Ellen Phiddian about the good and the bad uses of environmental DNA.
The Science Briefing is a LiSTNR podcast