219 - Developing a Portable System of Environmental DNA (eDNA) Surveillance to Monitor Fish Population Dynamics and Detect Invasive Species in Conesus Lake and The Philippine Seas

Climate change is an increasing threat to many ecosystems worldwide. Due to global warming, many species are under threat of extinction while others are forced into unusual patterns of migration. In the Philippines, the fish Round Scad is a cheap source of protein in the diet of common citizens. Alarmingly, it is rapidly declining in both population and body size. In this project, we aim to develop a cheap, rapid, and sensitive method of monitoring the population dynamics of this fish in the wild. Recently, a new method called environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding has been developed as a cost-effective way to monitor species richness and the presence of invasive species in marine ecosystems simply by detecting DNA released by dead tissues shed from organisms in the environment. Combined with the recent development of Nanopore MINion, a portable and cheap 3rd generation DNA sequencing technology, we hope to build a portable system of eDNA metabarcoding that can be used in the field to monitor Round Scad population dynamics in the Philippine Seas, as well as detecting the presence of invasive species. As a 'proof of principle' study, we present our proposal here to examine the sensitivity of the system to detect two invasive fish species in our local Conesus lake: the rudd and the alewife. If successful, the deployment of this method in the Philippines may contribute to acquiring important data for informing sustainable management and conservation strategies of marine species facing global climate change stress.