Detecting community change in Arctic marine ecosystems using the temporal dynamics of environmental DNA

Abstract

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Proper environmental DNA metabarcoding data transformation reveals temporal stability of fish communities in a dendritic river system

“…Wacker et al (2019) showed a 20‐fold increase in eDNA concentration during summer reproduction for the freshwater pearl mussel ( Margaritefera margaritefera ) and Thalinger et al (2021) observed that longitudinal and lateral fish eDNA distribution is impacted by changes in seasonal water discharge. Change in eDNA abundance and species richness has also previously been reported in fish communities showing the effect of seasonality in marine and estuarine environments (Sigsgaard et al, 2017; Stoeckle et al, 2017), as well as in Artic metazoan communities (Sevellec et al, 2020). Finally, Handley et al (2019) showed that lake thermal stratification in summer changes spatial eDNA distribution for several fish species.…”

“…Moreover, it has been shown that relationship between fish community structure and environment can be detected using eDNA metabarcoding and that sample replicates show high reproducibility (Afzali et al, 2020; Berger et al, 2020; Boivin‐Delisle et al, 2021; Civade et al, 2016). However, despite recent studies investigating the effect of seasonality on eDNA (de Souza et al, 2016; Goldberg et al, 2011; Handley et al, 2019; Sevellec et al, 2020; Sigsgaard et al, 2017; Stoeckle et al, 2017; Thalinger et al, 2021; Wacker et al, 2019), sources of temporal variation in abundance in species eDNA need further investigation to improve the reliability of long‐term surveys of species community in aquatic ecosystems.…”

“…However, despite recent studies investigating the effect of seasonality on eDNA (de Souza et al, 2016;Goldberg et al, 2011;Handley et al, 2019;Sevellec et al, 2020;Sigsgaard et al, 2017;Stoeckle et al, 2017;Thalinger et al, 2021;Wacker et al, 2019), sources of temporal variation in abundance in species eDNA need further investigation to improve the reliability of long-term surveys of species community in aquatic ecosystems.…”

Ferries and Environmental DNA: Underway Sampling From Commercial Vessels Provides New Opportunities for Systematic Genetic Surveys of Marine Biodiversity

“…Coris julis is typically described as a benthic species so a high abundance in pelagic samples is potentially paradoxical; however, the species' eggs are pelagic and peak spawning occurs in June coincident with our survey period (Quignard and Pras, 1986;Alonso-Fernández et al, 2014). These observations suggest that some of the strongest fish signals we detected could be related to spawning events rather than to schooling fish (Sigsgaard et al, 2017;Sevellec et al, 2020). It is unclear whether this could also be the case also for the Belone belone peak detected in the June cruise, as it is epipelagic and its spawning time is also compatible with the period of our sampling campaign (Tsikliras et al, 2010).…”

Environmental Dna in an Ocean of Change: Status, Challenges and Prospects

“…As a case study, Howell, LaRue and Flanagan (2021) proposed to use snow-based eDNA for monitoring Weddell seals hauling out on fast ice. Recently, eDNA has been increasingly applied for monitoring coastal communities in the Canadian Arctic (Lacoursière-Roussel et al, 2018;Sevellec et al, 2021) highlighting the effectiveness of eDNA in documenting diversity over different spatial and temporal scales but also linking the timing of different life stages (occurrence of larvae, spawning) with the most abundant sequence data (Sevellec et al, 2021). Mesozooplankton communities from the Pacific Arctic have also recently been characterized with DNA metabarcoding Tachibana & Tsuda, 2020;Questel et al, 2021).…”