The World in a Drop of Water: DNA Tool Transforms Nature Tracking
Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
In their search for pink river dolphins, researchers in the Peruvian Amazon scooped up river water sloshing with genetic material that they hoped could trace the elusive creatures.
They found what they were looking for. And then some. The environmental DNA collected yielded information on 675 species, including dozens of land-based mammals like deer, jaguar, giant anteaters, monkeys and 25 species of bat.
"It's kind of mind blowing," said Kat Bruce, founder of the eDNA firm NatureMetrics, which carried out the study for the wildlife charity WWF.
The technology is increasingly used to track rare species. Bruce hopes eDNA will help revolutionise the way the world measures and monitors nature.
It is now at the heart of a $15 million dollar project with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to collect and analyse 30,000 freshwater samples over three years from major river systems-including the Amazon, Ganges and Mekong Delta.
With species in precipitous decline and growing calls for international targets on biodiversity protection, organisers say this "eBioAtlas" can help inform policy and focus scarce conservation resources.
"What the eBioAtlas will do in the middle of this mass extinction, is hopefully start to fill those gaps in in a way that is scalable," said Mike Morris, who heads the project for NatureMetrics, at an event showcasing the project at the IUCN conference in Marseille this week.
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