Kap København Formation - from geological discovery to a new frontier in environmental genomics

Few Arctic geological discoveries have had as far-reaching a scientific impact as the Kap København Formation in North Greenland. When Svend Funder and Christian Hjort visited the site in 1979, its prominent hills were believed to be glacial moraines. Instead, Funder quickly recognized that they contained a remarkable sequence of layered sand and clay deposited during an ancient ice-free period. Preserved shells, wood and plant remains revealed that a much warmer and richer environment had once existed only 600 kilometres from the North Pole.

This discovery became the Kap København Formation. Over the following decades, Funder played a leading role in exploring and scientifically describing it. He helped organize multidisciplinary expeditions, establish its geological framework and bring together specialists studying its plants, insects, marine life, chronology and climate. Their work reconstructed an open forest-tundra landscape that existed around two million years ago, when northern Greenland was considerably warmer than today. Not least, Ole Bennike, a former student of Funder, made a major contribution to the palaeoenvironmental reconstruction of the Kap København Formation. His detailed documentation of its stratigraphy and palaeobotany provided the framework for much of the subsequent research on the formation.

In 2006, Funder initiated a new expedition that approached the formation from an entirely new direction: the search for environmental DNA, or eDNA. Rather than relying only on visible fossils, the researchers collected frozen sediments in the hope they might contain microscopic genetic traces of organisms that once inhabited the landscape. Initial attempts produced little, but the carefully selected samples were preserved as analytical methods improved.