Assessing the fate of brown trout (Salmo trutta) environmental DNA in a natural stream using a sensitive and specific dual-labelled probe

Deutschmann, Björn; Müller, Anne-Kathrin; Hollert, Henner; Brinkmann, Markus

Assessing the fate of brown trout (Salmo trutta) environmental DNA in a natural stream using a sensitive and specific dual-labelled probe

dc.contributor.author	Deutschmann, Björn
dc.contributor.author	Müller, Anne-Kathrin
dc.contributor.author	Hollert, Henner
dc.contributor.author	Brinkmann, Markus
dc.date.accessioned	2023-10-18T18:06:36Z
dc.date.available	2023-10-18T18:06:36Z
dc.date.issued	2019
dc.description	Accepted version CC BY-NC-ND	en_US
dc.description.abstract	Environmental DNA (eDNA) analysis in the aquatic environment has emerged as a promising tool for diagnosis of the ecological status in comprehensive monitoring strategies and might become useful in context of the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) and other legislations to derive stressor-specific indicators. Despite many studies having made significant progress for the future use of eDNA in terms of ecosystem composition and detection of invasive/rare species in inland waters, much remains unknown about the transport and fate of eDNA under natural environmental conditions. We designed a specific dual-labelled probe to detect brown trout (Salmo trutta, L.) eDNA and used the probe to describe the fate of eDNA released from an aquaculture facility into the low mountain range stream Wehebach, Germany. The probe was shown to be specific to brown trout, as ponds housing rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) did not test positive. Even though we observed different strengths of eDNA signals for three ponds containing different brown trout quantities, no significant correlation was found between biomass (kg/L) and eDNA quantity. Our results indicate that the release of DNA from brown trout might be life stage and/or age-dependent. The effluents of the aquaculture facility were a source of high levels of eDNA which resulted in the greatest abundance of brown trout eDNA directly downstream of the facility. Despite the natural occurrence of brown trout in the Wehebach, as shown by ecological investigations conducted by authorities of the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany) and personal observations, we observed a significant decrease of relative abundance of eDNA in the Wehebach within the first 1.5 km downstream of the aquaculture. Our results suggest that concentrations of eDNA in running waters rapidly decrease under natural conditions due to dilution and degradation processes, which might have important implications for the utility of eDNA in environmental research.	en_US
dc.description.sponsorship	SOLUTIONS project (European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under Grant Agreement No. 603437)	en_US
dc.description.version	Peer Reviewed	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Deutschmann, B., Müller, A. K., Hollert, H., & Brinkmann, M. (2019). Assessing the fate of brown trout (Salmo trutta) environmental DNA in a natural stream using a sensitive and specific dual-labelled probe. Science of The Total Environment, 655, 321–327. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.SCITOTENV.2018.11.247	en_US
dc.identifier.doi	10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.11.247
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/10388/15147
dc.language.iso	en	en_US
dc.publisher	Elsevier	en_US
dc.rights	Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 Canada	*
dc.rights.uri	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/ca/	*
dc.subject	eDNA	en_US
dc.subject	Fate	en_US
dc.subject	Brown trout	en_US
dc.subject	Rainbow trout	en_US
dc.subject	Aquaculture	en_US
dc.subject	qPCR	en_US
dc.title	Assessing the fate of brown trout (Salmo trutta) environmental DNA in a natural stream using a sensitive and specific dual-labelled probe	en_US
dc.type	Article	en_US