Correct identification of a plant in a rapid, repeatable, and reliable fashion remains still a major challenge for many ecologists, field biologists and even taxonomists. This problem was the main reason for the development of a new technique that would allow relatively easy, fast and reliable identification from a tissue sample of any organism called DNA barcoding.  DNA barcoding has already shown itself to have unprecedented power for clarifying species identities and limits, uncovering new and often cryptic species, and allowing species identification of difficult specimens such as seeds, young seedlings, tissue fragments etc.

In Iceland DNA barcoding project is carried out by Icelandic Institute of Natural History. So far, over 300 taxa have been collected from the field and over 100 have already been barcoded. The poster will summarize the aims and development of the DNA barcoding project in Iceland.