Universität zu Köln

Schoenle, Alexandra ORCID: 0000-0002-0047-8077, Scepanski, Dominik ORCID: 0000-0002-0014-2258, Floß, Alexander, Büchel, Pascal, Koblitz, Ann-Kathrin, Scherwaß, Anja ORCID: 0000-0003-3467-9835, Arndt, Hartmut ORCID: 0000-0003-2811-3595 and Waldvogel, Ann-Marie ORCID: 0000-0003-2637-0766 (2024). The dilemma of underestimating freshwater biodiversity: morphological and molecular approaches. BMC Ecology and Evolution, 24 (1). pp. 1-18. Springer Nature. ISSN 2730-7182

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Abstract

[Artikel-Nr. 69] Background: Anthropogenic impacts on freshwater habitats are causing a recent biodiversity decline far greater than that documented for most terrestrial ecosystems. However, knowledge and description of freshwater biodiversity is still limited, especially targeting all size classes to uncover the distribution of biodiversity between different trophic levels. We assessed the biodiversity of the Lower Rhine and associated water bodies in the river’s flood plain including the river’s main channel, oxbows and gravel-pit lakes, spanning from the level of protists up to the level of larger invertebrate predators and herbivores organized in size classes (nano-, micro, meio- and macrofauna). Morphological diversity was determined by morphotypes, while the molecular diversity (amplicon sequencing variants, ASVs) was assessed through eDNA samples with metabarcoding targeting the V9 region of the 18S rDNA. Results: Considering all four investigated size classes, the percentage of shared taxa between both approaches eDNA (ASVs with 80–100% sequence similarity to reference sequences) and morphology (morphotypes), was always below 15% (5.4 ± 3.9%). Even with a more stringent filtering of ASVs (98–100% similarity), the overlap of taxa could only reach up to 43% (18.3 ± 12%). We observed low taxonomic resolution of reference sequences from freshwater organisms in public databases for all size classes, especially for nano-, micro-, and meiofauna, furthermore lacking metainformation if species occur in freshwater, marine or terrestrial ecosystems. Conclusions: In our study, we provide a combination of morphotype detection and metabarcoding that particularly reveals the diversity in the smaller size classes and furthermore highlights the lack of genetic resources in reference databases for this diversity. Especially for protists (nano- and microfauna), a combination of molecular and morphological approaches is needed to gain the highest possible community resolution. The assessment of freshwater biodiversity needs to account for its sub-structuring in different ecological size classes and across compartments in order to reveal the ecological dimension of diversity and its distribution.

Item Type:	Article
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID ORCID Put Code Schoenle, Alexandra UNSPECIFIED https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0047-8077 UNSPECIFIED Scepanski, Dominik UNSPECIFIED https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0014-2258 UNSPECIFIED Floß, Alexander UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Büchel, Pascal UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Koblitz, Ann-Kathrin UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Scherwaß, Anja UNSPECIFIED https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3467-9835 UNSPECIFIED Arndt, Hartmut UNSPECIFIED https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2811-3595 UNSPECIFIED Waldvogel, Ann-Marie UNSPECIFIED https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2637-0766 UNSPECIFIED
URN:	urn:nbn:de:hbz:38-814704
Identification Number:	10.1186/s12862-024-02261-y
Journal or Publication Title:	BMC Ecology and Evolution
Volume:	24
Number:	1
Page Range:	pp. 1-18
Number of Pages:	18
Date:	27 May 2024
Publisher:	Springer Nature
ISSN:	2730-7182
Language:	English
Faculty:	Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
Divisions:	Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences > Department of Biology > Zoologisches Institut
Subjects:	Life sciences
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Keywords Language Metabarcoding ; Morphotypes ; Species richness ; V9 region English
['eprint_fieldname_oa_funders' not defined]:	Publikationsfonds UzK
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	http://kups.ub.uni-koeln.de/id/eprint/81470