Nearly 180 years after they died of cold and starvation in the Canadian Arctic, four crewmembers who perished in the Franklin expedition have been identified thanks to genetic analyses that matched their DNA with that of living descendants.

Three of the victims were from HMS Erebus, one of the expedition's two vessels, and died at Erebus Bay, the researchers reported in a new study published Wednesday (May 6) in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports. The fourth victim, a captain on HMS Terror, is the first from that ship to be identified with DNA, according to a second study that was published Thursday (May 7) in the journal Polar Record.