The DNA Drive Project was collecting insects by swabbing any DNA traces that remain after insects collide with car license plates. Photo: DNA Drive / Supplied
Going on a road trip? Well now you can use your car to measure biodiversity.
The DNA Drive Project is collecting insects by swabbing any DNA traces that remain after insects collide with car licence plates.
The initiative is being run by University of Auckland researchers Dr Richard O'Rorke and Dr Aimee van der Reis.
It's aim is to collect 6000 samples across the country over the next year.
"There's a whole area of ecosystem sampling and also health sampling that just takes advantage of waste materials," O'Rorke said.
"For example, we have disease testing through wastewater. This is really just a waste product, information that people wash away when they hose down their car.
"But we can take advantage of that."
Van der Reis said they were hoping to get a good sense of insect diversity across New Zealand.
"The insects would mainly be winged insects because having to collide with a car they would need to be flying around," she said.
"Insects are just really pivotal to ecosystems and food webs. Of course they're critical as pollinators that help with our food. But we don't really know that much about them."
To take part in the project, motorists merely needed to be on a drive of more than 20 minutes, irrespective of the time of day or weather conditions.
Project leaders were distributing kits to people around the country.
A DNA Drive sampling kit. Photo: DNA Drive / Supplied
Participants were instructed to clean their number plate with wash cloths that were provided, before doing a swab of the plate.
"If we can't get rid of all the DNA, we can see the elevated levels at the end," van der Reis said.
"So then you'd go on your journey. Any insects that have collided and stayed on the number plate, we provide the tall pottles with toothpicks and we ask people if they can flick the the insects into the pottles."
A final swab of the number plate is then completed and inserted into a yellow labelled 2ml tube.
Van der Reis said DNA is then extracted from the alcohol pads that are returned.
"From the DNA extraction, we amplify the gene region through PCR and then from there we would go and we would run the species ID through a database and we'll see if we could get any matches."
O'Rorke said they were keen to develop it as a resource as there were a lot of gaps in the DNA databases of New Zealand insects.
"You could get a disease outbreak, say in the crop or in a agricultural species, and you could say 'we think we hypothesise that it's being spread by a certain insect," he said.
"If you've got prior data about what insects are where, then you can actually make a comparison."
A team of computer science students who had joined the project were making the process easier, O'Rorke said.
"They're actually creating an app for us that will hopefully make it much easier for people to just hit a button and track their journey, or to maybe draw where they've been onto their phones and submit that."
He added the process was "quite fun and painless".
"Your road trip might have your favourite playlist and a sunny day, but it's not complete without your own DNA drive sampling kit."
The sampling effort runs until the end of March 2026.
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