Abstract
AbstractEnvironmental DNA (eDNA) is increasingly being used to assess community composition in marine ecosystems. Applying eDNA approaches across broad spatial scales now provide the potential to inform biogeographic analyses. However, to date, few studies have employed this technique to assess broad biogeographic patterns across multiple taxonomic groups. Here, we compare eDNA‐derived communities of bony fishes and invertebrates, including corals and sponges, from 15 locations spanning the entire length of the Omani coast. This survey includes a variety of habitats, including coral and rocky reefs, and covers three distinct marine ecoregions. Our data support a known biogeographic break in fish communities between the north and the south of Oman; however, the eDNA data highlight that this faunal break is mostly reflected in schooling baitfish species (e.g., sardines and anchovies), whereas reef‐associated fish communities appear more homogeneous along this coastline. Furthermore, our data provide indications that these biogeographic breaks also affect invertebrate communities, which includes corals, sponges, and broader eukaryotic groups. The observed community shifts were correlated with local environmental and anthropogenic differences characteristic of this coastline, particularly for the eDNA‐derived bony fish communities. Overall, this study provides compelling support that eDNA sequencing and associated analyses may serve as powerful tools to detect community differences across biogeographic breaks and ecoregions, particularly in places where there is significant variation in oceanographic conditions or anthropogenic impacts.
Highlights
The latest wave of the molecular revolution has enabled biologists to isolate and amplify trace genetic material shed by multicellular organisms into their surrounding environment, often referred to as environmental DNA or Environmental DNA (eDNA) (Deagle et al, 2018; Taberlet et al, 2012)
This study provides compelling support that eDNA sequencing and associated analyses may serve as powerful tools to detect community differences across biogeographic breaks and ecoregions, in places where there is significant variation in oceanographic conditions or anthropogenic impacts
In marine environments, metabarcoding of eukaryotic eDNA sourced from a number of substrata (Koziol et al, 2019) allows scientists to address questions on ecosystem biodiversity across multiple trophic and taxonomic levels (Kelly et al, 2017; Stat et al, 2017), these studies have generally been limited to relatively small spatial scales (Jeunen et al, 2019; O’Donnell et al, 2017; Sawaya et al, 2019; West et al, 2020)
Summary
The latest wave of the molecular revolution has enabled biologists to isolate and amplify trace genetic material shed by multicellular organisms into their surrounding environment, often referred to as environmental DNA or eDNA (Deagle et al, 2018; Taberlet et al, 2012). The coastline of the Sultanate of Oman extends from the Strait of Hormuz in the north to the Yemeni border in the southwest and supports a wide array of marine biota and habitats, including offshore coral reefs, as well as coastal sand, rock, and reef (for an overview see Claereboudt, 2019) This region, provides an ideal environment to scale up eDNA approaches. This current creates an additional environmental gradient with potential to impede dispersal of marine organisms along this coastline This marked environmental variation across the Omani coastline is purported to contribute to a major biogeographic break between the southern Dhofar region in the Arabian Sea and the northern Sea of Oman into the Arabian/Persian Gulf. Determine whether eDNA data from the developed northern coastline of Oman are indicative of anthropogenic pressures and discuss its potential to inform future biomonitoring in the region
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