Utility of mitochondrial DNA in wildlife forensic science: reliable identification of confiscated materials from Eastern India

Abstract

The poachers adopted various cunning ways to modify the wildlife materials before commercialization. Thus, the confiscated wildlife materials is often a crime with no eyewitness and difficult for identification. However, accurate identification of the seized wildlife samples is vital for species identification, detection of trade origin and better conservation management. The study employed DNA sequencing based identification of suspected wildlife materials, received from forest departments in east India. We adopted sufficient safety measures while dealing with the samples and processed the entire job at the in-house facilities in Zoological Survey of India (ZSI), Kolkata. Among 21 confiscated wildlife materials, most of them are identified by Cytb gene, while one specimen by COI gene, and one by both COI and Cytb. All the confiscated amorphous samples are accurately detected by sequence similarity search (99%–100%), estimated genetic divergence, and return monophyly using NJ phylogenetic analysis. The study detected the on-going illegal trade of five of east India’s most threatened animals, B. gaurus, N. nebulosa, R. unicornis, L. olivacea, and P. molurus. The study further identified the illegal hunting of mammals (S. scrofa, B. indicus, M. muntjak, A. axis), avifauna (G. leucolophus), and herpetofauna (N. naja) in the region. The study affirms the efficacy of DNA based identification tools for detection of wildlife crime and forensic sciences.