Abstract
Stomach contents of the Antarctic toothfish, Dissostichus mawsoni, collected from subareas 58.4 and 88.3, were analyzed using next generation sequencing (NGS) technology. After processing the raw reads generated by the MiSeq platform, a total of 131,233 contigs (130 operational taxonomic units [OTUs]) were obtained from 163 individuals in subarea 58.4, and 75,961 contigs (105 OTUs) from 164 fish in subarea 88.3. At 98% sequence identity, species names were assigned to most OTUs in this study, indicating the quality of the DNA barcode database for the Antarctic Ocean was sufficient for molecular analysis, especially for fish species. A total of 19 species was identified from the stomach of D. mawsoni in this study, which included 14 fish species and five mollusks. More than 90% of contigs belonged to fish species, supporting the postulate that the major prey of D. mawsoni are fish. Two fish species, Macrourus whitsoni and Chionobathyscus dewitti, were the most important prey items (a finding similar to that of previous studies). We also obtained genotypes of prey items by NGS analysis, identifying an additional 17 representative haplotypes in this study. Comparison with three previous morphological studies and the NGS-based molecular identification in this study extended our knowledge regarding the prey of D. mawsoni, which previously was not possible. These results suggested that NGS-based diet studies are possible, if several current technical limitations, including the quality of the barcode database or the development of precise molecular quantification techniques to link them with morphological values, are overcome. To achieve this, additional studies should be conducted on various marine organisms.
Highlights
The Antarctic toothfish, Dissostichus mawsoni, belongs to the family Nototheniidae of the order Perciformes, which is native to the Southern Ocean
A total of 170 metazoan taxa covering 11 phyla were amplified based on next generation sequencing (NGS) analysis of pooled zooplankton samples collected from the Korean coastal waters in 2015, which supported that the newly designed universal c oxidase I (COI) primer sets would be reliable in the analysis of the stomach contents of D. mawsoni (Data S3)
A total of 140,177 contigs from subarea 58.4 and 80,933 contigs from subarea 88.3 were obtained after clustering at 99.6% and discarding the chimeric contigs and those of D. mawsoni itself (329 and 129 from subarea 58.4 and 88.3, respectively)
Summary
The Antarctic toothfish, Dissostichus mawsoni, belongs to the family Nototheniidae of the order Perciformes, which is native to the Southern Ocean. We used NGS to analyze the stomach contents of the Antarctic fish, Dissostichus mawsoni, and we compared them with data obtained from morphological analysis. At 98% sequence identity, a total of 11 and 14 species were identified in the stomachs of D. mawsoni collected in subarea 58.4 and 88.3, respectively, excluding ‘‘unknown’’ OTUs (Table 1).
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