Species identification of Australian marsupials using collagen fingerprinting

Carli Peters; Kristine K Richter; Tiina Manne; Joe Dortch; Alistair Paterson; Kenny Travouillon; Julien Louys; Gilbert J Price; Michael Petraglia; Alison Crowther; Nicole Boivin

doi:10.1098/rsos.211229

Species identification of Australian marsupials using collagen fingerprinting

R Soc Open Sci. 2021 Oct 27;8(10):211229. doi: 10.1098/rsos.211229. eCollection 2021 Oct.

Authors

Carli Peters¹, Kristine K Richter², Tiina Manne³, Joe Dortch⁴, Alistair Paterson⁴, Kenny Travouillon⁵, Julien Louys⁶, Gilbert J Price⁷, Michael Petraglia^{1

3

6

8}, Alison Crowther^{1

3}, Nicole Boivin^{1

3

8

9}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Archaeology, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany.
² Department of Anthropology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.
³ School of Social Science, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Qld 4071, Australia.
⁴ School of Social Sciences, University of Western Australia, Perth, WA 6009, Australia.
⁵ Western Australian Museum, Collections and Research, 49 Kew Street, Welshpool, WA 6106, Australia.
⁶ Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution, Griffith University, Nathan, Qld 4111, Australia.
⁷ School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Qld 4072, Australia.
⁸ Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA.
⁹ Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada.

Abstract

The study of faunal remains from archaeological sites is often complicated by the presence of large numbers of highly fragmented, morphologically unidentifiable bones. In Australia, this is the combined result of harsh preservation conditions and frequent scavenging by marsupial carnivores. The collagen fingerprinting method known as zooarchaeology by mass spectrometry (ZooMS) offers a means to address these challenges and improve identification rates of fragmented bones. Here, we present novel ZooMS peptide markers for 24 extant marsupial and monotreme species that allow for genus-level distinctions between these species. We demonstrate the utility of these new peptide markers by using them to taxonomically identify bone fragments from a nineteenth-century colonial-era pearlshell fishery at Bandicoot Bay, Barrow Island. The suite of peptide biomarkers presented in this study, which focus on a range of ecologically and culturally important species, have the potential to significantly amplify the zooarchaeological and paleontological record of Australia.

Keywords: Australia; ZooMS; archaeology; palaeontology; zooarchaeology.

Associated data

figshare/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5665537