Manhattan Students DNA Test Insects, Groceries

Matt Cost, 18, and Brenda Tan, 17, of Trinity School in Manhattan spent four months collecting 217 samples of organisms in their neighborhoods. The results? The pair discovered mislabeled food products and possibly a new species of cockroach.

What first appeared to be a dead American cockroach could be a previously undocumented species of roach. So Mr. Cost and Ms. Tan, both seniors, collected a few more examples, searching the basements of other apartment buildings, and took them to the museum to be analyzed.

...discovered that 11 of 66 typical household food items were mislabeled, including sheep’s milk cheese that was in fact made of cow’s milk, venison dog treats that were made of beef and sturgeon caviar that was actually Mississippi paddlefish.

But perhaps just as amazing to the young native New Yorkers was that a hot dog bought on the street showed nothing but cow DNA.

full story at NY Times