Researchers are trying to reconstruct Leonardo Da Vinci’s DNA from his paintings

tl;dr

Rockefeller’s researchers have found many different traces of DNA on his paintings but they don’t have his own DNA, so they don’t know which one it is, so they are trying to put all the same DNA together, using other data, so they can say which is probably the one most present on the paintings.

The study does not claim that the DNA belongs to Leonardo, but the team believes it has established a method and framework that can be used to investigate other artifacts. If the same Y chromosome sequence is consistently found across items, it could potentially be the key to assembling Leonardo’s genome, said study coauthor Dr. Charles Lee, professor at The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine in Farmington, Connecticut.

Tracking down the artist’s DNA could provide insights into his brilliant capabilities. The team believes that he had unusually high visual acuity, or the ability to see things in a more detailed way than the average person, based on his artwork.

Leonardo DNA Project – The Rockefeller University – Program for the Human Environment