Abstract
“Ancient DNA Research” is the practice of extracting, sequencing, and analyzing degraded DNA from dead organisms that are hundreds to thousands of years old. Today, many researchers are interested in adapting state-of-the-art molecular biological techniques and high-throughput sequencing technologies to optimize the recovery of DNA from fossils, then use it for studying evolutionary history. However, the recovery of DNA from fossils has also fueled the idea of resurrecting extinct species, especially as its emergence corresponded with the book and movie Jurassic Park in the 1990s. In this paper, I use historical material, interviews with scientists, and philosophical literature to argue that the search for DNA from fossils can be characterized as a data-driven and celebrity-driven practice. Philosophers have recently argued the need to seriously consider the role of data-driven inquiry in the sciences, and likewise, this history highlights the need to seriously consider the role of celebrity in shaping the kind of research that gets pursued, funded, and ultimately completed. On this point, this history highlights that the traditional philosophical and scientific distinctions between data-driven and hypothesis-driven research are not always useful for understanding the process and practice of science. Consequently, I argue that the celebrity status of a particular research practice can be considered as a “serious epistemic strategy” that researchers, as well as editors and funders, employ when making choices about their research and publication processes. This interplay between celebrity and methodology matters for the epistemology of science.
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Notes
Specifically, a fully mineralized fossil is unlikely to preserve DNA, whereas a subfossil, a partially mineralized part of an organism, may retain remains of its cellular or molecular components. Specifically, an organism’s status as a fossil or subfossil, or whether it exists as a piece of skin or tissue, matters when considering whether cellular or molecular components may be preserved. Regardless, I use the terms “ancient DNA research,” “the search for DNA from ancient and extinct organisms,” or the “search for DNA from fossils” interchangeably throughout this paper to refer to general study of degraded and damaged DNA from a variety of sources. Elsbeth Bösl has also written on the history of ancient DNA research via a recently published article, “Zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte der aDNA-Forschung” (March 2017), and a recently published book, Doing Ancient DNA: Zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte Der Adna-Forschung (August 2017), in German. See Bösl (2017a, b).
Research dedicated to the idea of bringing back extinct species is known as “de-extinction” and refers to the process of recreating an organism that is a member of, or resembles a member of, an extinct species through back-breeding, cloning, genetic engineering, or reverse genetic engineering. I use the terms “de-extinction,” “resurrection,” and the idea of “bringing back extinct organisms” interchangeably in this paper. See Shapiro (2015) and Wray (2017).
Interviewees were selected via the professional and popular literature (scientific publications to media reports and reviews) on the topics of ancient DNA activity and de-extinction. Interviewees were also selected at “Ancient DNA: the first three decades,” a commemorative conference hosted by the Royal Society in London in November 2013 to celebrate its 30-year history. Additionally, interviewees were identified by “snowball sampling,” the process by which potential interviewees are chosen based on recommendations made by previous interviewees (Atkinson and Flint 2001). Overall, many interviewees were high-profile researchers in the field. However, efforts were taken to reach out to scientists who were less well-known or who have been or have felt marginalized throughout the history of their science and even today. This methodology (the interview process and permissions) was approved by the Ethics Committee in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at University College London. Interviewees gave consent for the author to use their interviews and information in the form of anonymized quotations. For additional information on methodology, see Jones (2017).
This does not mean that a quantitative approach would not be useful or will not be done in the future. However, for the purposes of this research, the primary objective was to conduct and analyze extensive qualitative interviews with a wide-range of scientists in the field from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds and national contexts using oral history methods.
The fact that I am writing about the role of celebrity in science makes me a participant in the making of celebrity too. First, in telling a narrative of ancient DNA research as a science under the influence of celebrity, I am reinforcing the spotlight which will further affect the researchers working in or around this practice. Second, in writing about celebrity, I am acknowledging that my research is a product of it and that it will be affected by it. Sure enough, there will be consequences from situating my work within a celebrity science context, and I appreciate the need to be reflexive regarding this issue.
Scholars have discussed the role of celebrity in science at the individual level. In the 1970s, science communication scholar Rae Goodell profiled a series of scientists from the anthropologist Margaret Mead and biologist Paul Ehrlich to the chemist Linus Pauling and astronomer Carl Sagan. Goodell called these scientists “visible scientists” (Goodell 1975). According to Goodell, these visible scientists shared personal and professional characteristics (media-oriented characteristics) that helped them attain press and public visibility. They used their visibility as a platform from which to speak to the public not just about science but also about science policy. More recently, Declan Fahy introduced the notion of “celebrity scientists” (Fahy 2015). For Fahy, this is a new type of scientist that has emerged in light of the rise of the new celebrity culture. These celebrity scientists, like the late cosmologist Stephen Hawking and late paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould, were credentialed experts in their professional sphere but had also attained fame, fortune, and influence in the public realm. As celebrity scientists, they used the media as a public platform to popularize science then influence public attitudes towards science. According to Fahy, however, stardom’s influence cuts both ways. In fact, their stardom affords them influence outside and within science. In other words, stardom filters back into science, affecting the process of science.
In my work, I am talking about the role of celebrity on the group level and the importance of understanding how a subject of science can be made into and marketed as a commodity. Thinking of celebrity on the group level requires us to ask and answer the following questions: How does the mass media represent a subject of science to the public? How do researchers respond to the media spotlight? What are the effects of this attention on the science itself? In the case of the history of ancient DNA research, my studies explored how celebrity works in relation to a subject of science, namely the practice of extracting DNA from fossils for studying evolutionary history and even potentially using that DNA to bring extinct species, such as dinosaurs, back to life.
My doctoral research argued that the history of ancient DNA research can be characterized as a history of celebrity science. The term “celebrity science” is an original concept and initial product of my historical and archival research as well as my interviews with scientists. In my doctoral thesis, I argued that a celebrity science is a subject of science that evolves within a shared conceptual space of professional, press, and public expectations that contribute to the shaping of the science. Here, the mass media are critical in the making of a celebrity science because they seek the science as well as its scientists for its news values and potential to attract public attention. But press and public interest are not enough. Researchers have to participate in the process, too. The mass media are so influential that researchers respond, positively or negatively, to the attention and even reinvent the reputation of their technoscience accordingly. Ultimately, a celebrity science is the outcome of prolonged publicity advanced by a relationship that is actively pursued then produced by both scientists and members of the media. It is an active process and a dialectical process. Ancient DNA is a case study of celebrity science but is by no means an exclusive example of it. Broadly, my doctoral thesis suggests this concept as a model for other scholars interested in studying other sciences in the media spotlight. For additional information on this concept, see Jones (2017).
For a definition of publicity, see https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/publicity. For a definition of celebrity, see https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/celebrity.
PCR uses repeated cycles of heating and cooling to copy DNA. First, heat is used to separate double-stranded DNA into single-stranded DNA. The single-stranded DNA is then exposed to primers. The primers attach themselves to the appropriate sites of the desired DNA to be amplified. A copy of the targeted DNA is produced and used as a template to generate further copies. This process continues with the targeted DNA being exponentially amplified creating millions to billions of copies of the original sequence of interest from only a small amount of genetic material (Mullis and Faloona 1987). See Rabinow (1996) for a detailed conceptual, technological, and financial history of PCR’s development.
With concerns for ancient DNA authentication, the “Ancient DNA Lab” became known as a “clean lab,” a specially constructed laboratory space designed to minimize contamination of the small amount of genetic material in ancient samples with much more abundant modern DNA. Drawing on guidelines outlined in previous publications, Cooper and Poinar argued that labs handling ancient material must be physically isolated from other molecular or microbial labs containing modern genetic material (Pääbo et al. 1989; Handt et al. 1994; Cooper and Poinar 2000). Other publications expanded on these expectations (Pääbo et al. 2004; Willerslev et al. 2004; Gilbert et al. 2005). For example, some scientists said that ancient DNA activity from extractions to experiments should be conducted in a physically isolated lab with positive air pressure and specific ventilation systems to prevent contamination via air flow when entering or exiting the lab. Ideally, these clean labs should be housed in a separate building and away from any building where PCR amplification of DNA is performed. All equipment brought into the clean lab should be decontaminated via bleach or UV irradiation as appropriate. Further, the clean lab should be decontaminated with bleach before and after each entry, and every evening UV lights should be used to further sterilize the space. With every entry to the clean lab, researchers were also required to dress in full body suits with gloves, shoe covers, hair nets, and face masks to avoid themselves from contaminating the specimen during experimentation.
A number of interviewees referred to this division as a schism between the “believers” and “non-believers” (5; 6; 23; 28; 36). This division between “believers” and “non- believers” centered around debates about contamination and scientific standards for avoiding it. While both sides were aware of contamination, they differed in the degree they employed methods to test for ancient DNA authenticity. Roughly, the “non-believers” were suspicious, even dismissive, of research results produced by the “believers.” The “non-believers” more or less viewed research by the “believers” as less rigorous and therefore, less reliable. These terms—“believers” and “non-believers”—are categories that interviewees on both sides of the schism used in reference to themselves and others. There are some scientists who also refer to the schism as a difference between the “haves” and “have nots,” and while not all interviewees used both or even one set of terms to describe the split, they all recognized the split, though to differing degrees, and its influence on the sociology of their science. However, it is important to note that the line between the “believers” and “non-believers” is not necessarily hard and fast. It is permeable. Indeed, some scientists tried to collaborate across the schism. Nonetheless, the caricature of “believers” and “non-believers” helps scientists make sense of an important issue, concerns about contamination, and its influence on ancient DNA’s disciplinary development. On this point, it is by no means the only map of interactions that interviewees try to draw, or that can be drawn, throughout the history of this community.
Next-generation sequencing (NGS) is the general term used to describe a variety of technologies that use parallelized platforms to sequence more than one million short reads of DNA (50–400 base pairs) in a single run. There are a number of NGS platforms varying in their chemistry and specific sequence read technologies. Two instruments that were widely used in ancient DNA research in the late 2000s were Roche (454) GS FLX, a technology based on parallel pyrosequencing, and Illumina (Solexa) Genome Analyzer, a method based on reversible terminators. The 454 technology generates longer reads of DNA (over 400 base pairs) but is somewhat error-prone in homopolymeric regions (e.g. CCCCCC), while Illumina generates shorter reads of DNA (100–150 base pairs), but in greater numbers. See (Margulies et al. (2005) and Knapp and Hofreiter (2010).
In a recent paper, Alexandra Ion problematizes the idea of ancient genetic or genomic data as being a “holy grail” in the sense that this kind of data can always provide new and better answers to old archeological questions (Ion 2017). Ion explained, “Given the fragmentary nature of the material record, archaeologists are ever-expanding their intellectual and methodological tool-box, going beyond the disciplinary boundaries, and involving themselves in what are often called interdisciplinary projects. Chapman and Wylie (2016: 15) raise in their latest book the interesting point that this phenomenon is closely tied to an ‘epistemic anxiety’ inherent to archaeological reasoning, namely the fear that there is only so much we can learn about the past, especially if this knowledge is to be ‘objective’. I would claim that in archaeology we now see a structuring of discourses around interdisciplinarity as a way of framing relevance and innovation in the face of the ‘manifold and messy’ problems of life and society […]” (Ion 2017, 88). Drawing on the example of King Richard III and a series of studies that use ancient molecular data to shed light on the Neolithic Revolution, Ion questioned whether this genetic data from the “hard sciences” is successfully being integrated with the historical and cultural contexts that archeologists are traditionally interested in investigating. She also brought attention to the important issue of how these big databases bias archeologists in terms of the types of questions they ask and the scales of analyses they employ.
The study of ancient DNA data had previously been limited to the study of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and sometimes nuclear DNA (nuDNA). Recently, however, the potential to sequence whole genomes via high-throughput sequencing technologies has allowed researchers to produce an increased amount of higher quality data (from several sequences to billions of sequences) that has allowed them to more accurately quantify contamination, and therefore guarantee DNA authenticity. It has also allowed them to study the entire genomic make up of an organism, more similarly to how modern genomes are analyzed, and this has provided more detailed answers to questions regarding phenotype, adaptation and evolution together with documenting when migration and gene flow events have occurred. As a result, researchers recently reported that the “field” has “entered the new era of genomics and has provided valuable information when testing specific hypotheses related to the past” (Der Sarkissian et al. 2015).
This phrasing presupposes that ancient DNA data holds relevant molecular information about the organism it came from and its evolutionary history. However, scientists, after extracting the DNA, must still make sense of the DNA by analyzing, interpreting, and appropriately applying it to questions in evolutionary biology. In other words, the answers are not explicit in the data themselves. Scientists must manipulate the data in order to make meaning.
In 2000, Alan Cooper and Hendrik Poinar published a paper in Science titled “Ancient DNA: Do it Right or Not at All” that detailed a strict set of criteria for avoiding or detecting contamination in the lab.
This shift from “too little data” to “too much data” is meant to be understood as a comparison between ancient DNA research’s past and present. Even if researchers are able to produce more data, comparatively speaking, the data is still often of poor or patchy quality. This requires researchers to find ways of handling and analyzing the data. Today, there is much more data than before, but the amount of ancient DNA data if compared to the influx of modern DNA data is still far off.
Most recently and obviously, new whole-genome sequencing technologies have pushed ancient DNA researchers to seek new skills in statistics, bioinformatics, and population genetics in order to analyze the massive amounts of data that can now be extracted from hundreds of samples thanks to technology. However, it is important to note that ancient DNA researchers are much more than a user community of the machinery. Here, they are committed to developing new methods that can be used in the lab to optimize the extraction and sequencing process. In other words, although new technologies and techniques are critical to ancient DNA activity and the extent to which data can be made available and analyzed, practitioners do not just draw on developments in other fields but instead are active individuals in adapting these innovations for their own purposes. Ancient DNA requires manipulation and management of data namely because the nature of ancient DNA is not the same as that of modern DNA. Indeed, the extraction, sequencing, and analysis of degraded and damaged DNA requires a specialist skill set to understand the biochemistry of DNA damage in order to be able to correctly infer how differences between sequences relate to differences among individuals and populations over time.
To be sure, archeologists, paleontologists, and curators are vital to the pursuit of DNA from ancient and extinct organisms. They are valuable for sample access as well as knowledge on the historical and biological background needed in order to give context to the data obtained from a specific sample. However, there is a tension between those researchers responsible for conserving specimen collections and those interested in sampling organisms for genetic information. This is because sampling for ancient DNA is destructive to the specimen, and this was certainly a concern in the early years of ancient DNA research. See Graves and Braun (1992). Museums value their collections for their rarity, and their main mission is to conserve past and present specimens for future generations to study or enjoy. While molecular methods offer new opportunities for curators to make new uses of old collections, taking samples of skin, tissue, or bone can damage often rare or important specimens. This presents a clear challenge to researchers and curators to find a compromise between their motives. To a certain extent, this challenge can cause a significant dichotomy between the large labs in ancient DNA research who are driving more and more specimen sampling and those curators who are trying to minimize damage to museum collections. See Freedman et al. (2017).
Turner, for example, spotlighted the positive and negative effects that publicity can have on the science of paleontology. Here, Turner noted the disproportionate attention directed towards organismic reconstruction in general, and dinosaur paleontology in specific, while evolutionary paleontology with its much more theoretical nature remained lesser known to popular audiences (2011, 10). According to Turner, some scientists often feel that too much attention, or a disproportionate amount of attention, can distort the public perception of relevant scientific research. This issue of publicity and prestige extends to the physical sciences as well. Joseph Martin noted that in the field of physics, areas such as high energy physics and cosmology often received more public attention than other areas like solid state and condensed matter physics. Martin argues that this is interesting given that the majority of research in physics is dedicated to work in solid state and condensed matter physics. Martin called this a “prestige asymmetry” in which similar activities receive unequal attention and admiration (Martin 2017).
As a work in the history of science, I am aware that this paper has not explored the social context in which the search for DNA from fossils emerged then evolved. It has also not explained the context or causes that might be responsible for such a celebrity-driven approach in the first place. I want to make a few points in reference to part of my work that I have intentionally neglected in this paper. First, researchers today do not solely seek celebrity for their 5 min of fame; they seek it because there is an expectation for them to popularize their research to the public through the press. The modern science communication movement of the 1980s, initiated in the UK but influential in the US and elsewhere, along with other developments towards the “mediatization,” “medialization,” and “celebrification” of science have set the stage for these expectations and for the intense interplay between science and media (Nelkin 1995; Gregory and Miller 1998; Evans and Hesmondhalgh 2005; Broks 2006; Radder 2010; Rödder et al. 2012; Bucchi and Trench 2014). Decisions regarding funding and employment are often evaluated with an eye towards impact, outreach, and publicity. Indeed, news value affects more than science reporting; it also affects how and what science gets published. By extension, it also affects an individual’s or a group’s success within science. One interviewee described this as a self-perpetuating system, where newsworthy studies that make high-profile publications lead to high-profile press, which leads to further funding (25-01:21:45). According to some scientists, this system has created a sort of scientist skilled in packaging their research to both scientific journals and journalists. The result is a media-savvy scientist (but not perhaps a celebrity science in Fahy’s sense or even a visible scientist according to Goodell’s analysis) who has learned the language of the press, including differences between scientific and journalistic expectations and practices when it comes to reporting research. In the history of ancient DNA research, we see that researchers are responding to the call to communicate and that their position in the spotlight gives them opportunities to do so. In tracing the evolution of practice like ancient DNA research, its evolution into a celebrity-driven science captures the consequences of the ever-closer connection between science and media, including its influences on the practice of science and science communication. An analysis of the causes and consequences of celebrity-driven science cannot be fully discussed in this article but will be covered at a different time. See Jones (2017) for an initial discussion of these ideas.
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Acknowledgements
Funding for this research was provided by the University College London (UCL) Overseas Research Scholarship, the UCL Graduate Research Scholarship, and the UCL Cross-Disciplinary Training Scholarship. Funding was also provided by the British Society for the History of Science, the History of Science Society, the UCL Department of Science and Technology Studies, the UCL Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, and the Division of Paleontology at the American Museum of Natural History. Thank you to Joe Cain and the Department of Science and Technology Studies, Mark Thomas and the Molecular and Cultural Evolution Lab, and Anjali Goswami’s Lab for their dedication to developing this research project. Most importantly, thank you to the scientists, my interviewees, who gave much of their time and thoughts to this project. This research would not be possible without the information, documentation, and quotations they openly provided. My appreciation also goes to colleagues at two workshops, the UK Integrated History and Philosophy of Science Workshop (2017) at the University of Nottingham in England and the Philosophy of Paleontology Workshop (2017) at the University of Calgary in Canada, where the ideas in this article were presented and discussed. In regards to the latter workshop, I am especially appreciative of Adrian Currie and colleagues who offered vital feedback on drafts of this article for this special issue. Finally, thank you to Lucy van Dorp for her corrections and comments, and thank you to the two reviewers whose thorough readings and recommendations have bettered the overall argument.
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Jones, E.D. Ancient genetics to ancient genomics: celebrity and credibility in data-driven practice. Biol Philos 34, 27 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-019-9675-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-019-9675-1