Adopting new technologies requires building familiarity and trust, and this is where SMEA Professor Ryan Kelly and his research group, the eDNA Collaborative comes in. This new effort at the University of Washington aims to accelerate Environmental DNA (eDNA) research by supporting existing projects and building a network of practitioners to advance the nascent field. Professor Kelly likens the young field of eDNA research to how various new technologies develop and take off.

“Experimentation is how technologies develop, and as with the early days of any new tech, it’s a soup of ideas with eDNA research,” Kelly said. “While people are still inventing, we don’t want to impose standards in a top-down way. We want to encourage best practices without squelching creativity. That’s what this Collaborative will help do: accelerate the field from the bottom up.”

Read more about the exciting work of Professor Kelly and the eDNA Collaborative in the full UW News article by Michelle Ma.