From drawers to genomes: revealing hidden evolutionary histories in insect collections

SemIDEEV
 19/06/2026
 12:00:00
 Antoine TOURET- Lund University - Sweden
 IDEEV - Salle Rosalind Franklin

Museum collections have long served as repositories of biodiversity, preserving specimens that document the history of life on Earth. Recent advances in museomics, the application of genomic approaches to historical and archival specimens, have expanded their value beyond traditional taxonomy and systematics. By recovering genomic information from museum specimens, it is now possible to investigate evolutionary relationships, population history, genome evolution, and potentially even aspects of species ecology and biological interactions.

I will present an overview of museomics and discuss the types of biological information that can be recovered from historical insect collections. Through examples from Drosophilidae, including ongoing research on the Tristan da Cunha fauna, Drosophila enhydrobia, and the newly discovered genus Aroidiphila. I will illustrate how museum specimens can be used to address questions ranging from phylogenetics and population genomics to the reconstruction of chemosensory gene repertoires. I will also discuss current limitations of museomics, including DNA degradation, contamination, and uneven preservation, as well as perspectives for the field.