Application of eDNA metabarcoding for high-resolution reconstruction of the trophic web of an Arctic fjord
Abstract
In a rapidly changing Arctic, the Kongsfjorden marine ecosystem was investigated to explore its community composition and structural dynamics using environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding. Samples were collected with metaprobes , passive eDNA samplers deployed within fish traps in the coastal zone and towed along a transect in the mid-fjord zone. Mitochondrial COI and ribosomal 18 S SSU (V8-V9 region) genes were amplified to characterize metazoan and protist communities, respectively. Community analysis highlighted significant differences between coastal and mid-fjord sites (ANOSIM, R = 0.7, p < 0.05), identifying 23 taxa as indicators of one of the two zones. Taxa identified through metabarcoding were used as nodes in trophic networks, while feeding relationships (producer–consumer and predator–prey) were reconstructed through literature review. Qualitative food webs were obtained for each sampling site and for the coastal and mid-fjord zones. The networks were characterized using key trophic indicators and differences emerged in the apical part of the webs. Overall, eDNA proved to be a sensitive and effective tool for detecting spatial differences in community structure. This approach also shows strong potential for long-term monitoring, offering a rapid, cost-effective, and scalable alternative to traditional methods.
Related
- Omitting end preparation reduces index misassignment in Nanopore-based DNA metabarcoding: application to a decadal coastal time series in the Sea of Okhotsk
- TRIDENT (Taxonomic Resolution and IDentification using Environmental dNa Traces): An Optimized Algorithm for Vertebrate Taxonomic Assignments in eDNA Metabarcoding, Integrating Molecular, Taxonomic, and Ecological Criteria
- HiC-LEGO: Biologically Guided High-Resolution 3D Genome Reconstruction Preserves Chromatin Organization at Kilobase Resolution
- MedGSSR: Generalizable Medical Image Super-Resolution 3D Reconstruction via Hierarchical Feed-forward Gaussian Splatting
- Trustworthy super-resolution reconstruction across spatial omics modalities
BibTeX
@article{piroli2026application,
title = {{Application of eDNA metabarcoding for high-resolution reconstruction of the trophic web of an Arctic fjord}},
author = {Chiara Piroli and Nadia Marinchel and Simone Galli and Tommaso Russo and Maurizio Azzaro and Francesco Filiciotto and Gabriele Di Marco and Alessia D’Agostino and Angelo Gismondi and Adriana Profeta},
journal = {Scientific Reports},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1038/s41598-026-73554-z},
url = {https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-026-73554-z},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Application of eDNA metabarcoding for high-resolution reconstruction of the trophic web of an Arctic fjord
AU - Chiara Piroli
AU - Nadia Marinchel
AU - Simone Galli
AU - Tommaso Russo
AU - Maurizio Azzaro
AU - Francesco Filiciotto
AU - Gabriele Di Marco
AU - Alessia D’Agostino
AU - Angelo Gismondi
AU - Adriana Profeta
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/01
JO - Scientific Reports
DO - 10.1038/s41598-026-73554-z
UR - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-026-73554-z
AB - In a rapidly changing Arctic, the Kongsfjorden marine ecosystem was investigated to explore its community composition and structural dynamics using environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding. Samples were collected with metaprobes , passive eDNA samplers deployed within fish traps in the coastal zone and towed along a transect in the mid-fjord zone. Mitochondrial COI and ribosomal 18 S SSU (V8-V9 region) genes were amplified to characterize metazoan and protist communities, respectively. Community analysis highlighted significant differences between coastal and mid-fjord sites (ANOSIM, R = 0.7, p < 0.05), identifying 23 taxa as indicators of one of the two zones. Taxa identified through metabarcoding were used as nodes in trophic networks, while feeding relationships (producer–consumer and predator–prey) were reconstructed through literature review. Qualitative food webs were obtained for each sampling site and for the coastal and mid-fjord zones. The networks were characterized using key trophic indicators and differences emerged in the apical part of the webs. Overall, eDNA proved to be a sensitive and effective tool for detecting spatial differences in community structure. This approach also shows strong potential for long-term monitoring, offering a rapid, cost-effective, and scalable alternative to traditional methods.
SN - 2045-2322
ER -