<div><p>New Yorkers are used to fighting each other for space, but there may be a new contender in town according to a Rockefeller study that appears to have uncovered a new species of cockroach.</p><p>"The cockroach is genetically modified. Species don't differ more than one percent, this cockroach is four percent different, which suggests it is a new species of cockroach," Professor Mark Stoeckle, an expert on genomics and DNA barcoding at Rockefeller University, told AFP.</p><p>"We think that the museums of natural history in Paris or New York could be interested."</p><p>The previously-unidentified creepy-crawly was uncovered as part of a project undertaken by two high-school students, Brenda Tan, 17, and Matt Cost, 18, under Stoeckle's supervision.</p><p>In their roles as "DNAHouse investigators," the pair trawled New York apartments, stores and street, collecting 217 specimens between November 2008 and March 2009.</p><p>They took samples from supermarket food, the remains of an insect found in a box of fruit, a feather from a duster, dried dung and a cockroach and matched DNA sequences using the Barcode of Life Database and GenBank.</p><p>The American Museum of Natural History laboratory identified 170 genetic codes, leading the researchers to identify 95 different animal species, including some that were unexpected.</p><p>"A feather from a duster yielded ostrich DNA. A delicacy labeled 'sturgeon caviar' instead turned out to be from the strange-looking paddlefish. A popular Asian snack was revealed as giant flying squid. Bison DNA was found in a dog biscuit," the pair wrote on the Rockefeller University website.</p><p>In fact, they found that 16 percent of food items were mislabeled, including cheeses labeled sheep's milk that were actually made of cow's milk, a potentially dangerous labelling error for those with allergies.</p><p>But perhaps the biggest surprise for the researchers was the discovery of "a genetically distinct 'mystery' cockroach that might be a new species."</p><p>"By appearance it looks like the American cockroach (Periplaneta americana) but it is genetically different from other American cockroaches in the databases," the researchers said.</p><img src="http://admatch-syndication.mochila.com/images/ad.gif?aid=65927205&bid=informcom" /></div><div id="copyright"><div>

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