Prof. Paul Hebert, the director of the University of Guelph’s Centre for Biodiversity Genomics, and the DNA barcoding technology he helped develop was featured in a Guardian  newspaper article examining the technology’s use in discovering “cryptic species.”

DNA barcoding can identify and differentiate between animal and plant species using their genetic divergence, the article notes, and many species of plants and animal life once thought to be similar are not being shown to be in fact many and separate species.

The technology is showing that the world is “even more wonderfully biodiverse than we suspected,” comments one scientist.

The article notes the first species discoveries made using DNA barcoding were made in Costa Rica by U of G’s Hebert who, the article notes, is the “father of DNA barcoding.”