Uncovering the Encanto of Colombia’s Plants
LSU’s College of Science is always looking to answer the next big question and to embark on new journeys. Recently Dr. Laura P. Lagomarsino, director of LSU’s Shirley C. Tucker Herbarium, helped lead a six-week trip to Colombia to research and collect samples of different plant specimens and to answer their big research question.
Lagomarsino’s team consisted of her postdoctoral researcher Dr. Ana María Bedoya, her graduate student Diego Paredes-Burneo, and research associate Daniel Santamaría-Aguilar, as well as Dr. Carrie Tribble from University of Hawaii. Throughout the team’s journey, they met Colombian researchers and built a community. Together they were able to experience the intensity and the encanto of Colombia's plants.
“As a field biologist, I was mesmerized by the landscapes, animals, and culture in Colombia. As a Peruvian, I loved to learn how similar our scientific communities are,” Paredes-Burneo said.
The goal of their research was to kickstart Lagomarsino’s new National Science Foundation grant that funds this plant diversification project. This grant was awarded to Lagomarsino, along with two additional principal investigators, Rosana Zenil-Ferguson at the University of Hawaii and Rachel Schwartz at the University of Rhode Island.
“Colombia was the perfect place to go for this grant because the research question we have is focused on plant evolution across the Andes, and the Colombian Andes are geographically the youngest and most complex region of the whole mountain chain,” Lagomarsino said.
Their big question: What role has geology and ecology played in driving the evolution of various plant groups? Answering it would put them in a position to understand potential threats to biodiversity, including global climate change and anthropogenic landscape modifications that impact species interactions, including pollination.
Yet to answer this question they needed to have samples, so they went to Colombia to help generate genomic and morphological data.
The LSU researchers collaborated with scientists at the National University of Colombia, including Dr. Julián Aguirre Santoro and students Laura Lucía Vargas and Deisy Marcela Angarita Ospina. Some of the plants they collected include bellflowers, bromeliads, blueberries and lily relatives.
At night, they pressed the samples to flatten them, and the end product would be deposited to the herbarium in Colombia. Once LSU’s Herbarium receives the duplicates, the researchers will extract the DNA from the species to have their genomes sequenced.
One of the challenges they endured while on this trip was the weather. They just so happened to be there during the beginning of Colombia’s rainy season, which meant there were landslides, and they had to be cautious on the roads while traveling.
Another challenge was the COVID-19 pandemic. Cases in Colombia had increased significantly during the Omicron wave at the beginning of their trip.
“We designed a field safety plan that explicitly involved regular testing for COVID, and we wore N95 masks,” said Lagomarsino. Fortunately, no one within their group was exposed to covid.
Now the biggest reward, according to Lagomarsino, was coming together and creating a research community with researchers at the Colombian institutions. They were also able to do a lot of network building, which will be beneficial to LSU’s College of Science community for years to come, Lagomarsino said.
“There’s a feel of magic when you’re out there collecting specimens, and you see them in person. You see all the vibrant colors and smell all the scents of living plants,” Lagomarsino said.