Characterization and comparison of poorly known moth communities through DNA barcoding in two Afrotropical environments in Gabon

Abstract

Biodiversity research in tropical ecosystems—popularized as the most biodiverse habitats on Earth—often neglects invertebrates, yet invertebrates represent the bulk of local species richness. Insect communities in particular remain strongly impeded by both Linnaean and Wallacean shortfalls, and identifying species often remains a formidable challenge inhibiting the use of these organisms as indicators for ecological and conservation studies. Here we use DNA barcoding as an alternative to the traditional taxonomic approach for characterizing and comparing the diversity of moth communities in two different ecosystems in Gabon. Though sampling remains very incomplete, as evidenced by the high proportion (59%) of species represented by singletons, our results reveal an outstanding diversity. With about 3500 specimens sequenced and representing 1385 BINs (Barcode Index Numbers, used as a proxy to species) in 23 families, the diversity of moths in the two sites sampled is higher than the current number of species listed for the entire country, highlighting the huge gap in biodiversity knowledge for this country. Both seasonal and spatial turnovers are strikingly high (18.3% of BINs shared between seasons, and 13.3% between sites) and draw attention to the need to account for these when running regional surveys. Our results also highlight the richness and singularity of savannah environments and emphasize the status of Central African ecosystems as hotspots of biodiversity.

Fine‐tuning biodiversity assessments: A framework to pair eDNA metabarcoding and morphological approaches

“…Harper et al., 2020) species distributions, and helped guide management decisions, in both areas from which little biodiversity data are available (e.g. Delabye et al., 2019), and complex communities (e.g. Groendahl et al., 2017).…”

Trends in DNA barcoding and metabarcoding

“…Two contributions to this special issue apply individualbased DNA barcoding methods to hyper-diverse and underexplored biotas. Focusing on an underexplored area of the Afrotropical biogeographic region, Delabye et al (2019) survey and DNA barcode macromoths at two sites in Gabon. This team has discovered more provisional species than had been previously recorded in prior species lists for the entire country.…”

Evaluating DNA Barcoding for Species Identification and Discovery in European Gracillariid Moths

“…Meanwhile, only a small fraction of species on Earth have been formally described and assigned a scientific name (Scheffers et al, 2012), so many taxa are likely to go extinct before we know of their existence (Eggleton, 2020). The incompleteness of our current census of life, referred as the "Linnean shortfall" (Raven and Wilson, 1992), is especially acute for the most diverse yet least studied groups such as small insects, and for the high diversity tropics (Delabye et al, 2019;Lopez-Vaamonde et al, 2019).…”