Quantifying Species Diversity with a DNA Barcoding-Based Method: Tibetan Moth Species (Noctuidae) on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

With the ongoing loss of biodiversity, there is a great need for fast and effective ways to assess species richness and diversity: DNA barcoding provides a powerful new tool for this. We investigated this approach by focusing on the Tibetan plateau, which is one of the world's top biodiversity hotspots. There have been few studies of its invertebrates, although they constitute the vast majority of the region's diversity. Here we investigated species diversity of the lepidopteran family Noctuidae, across different environmental gradients, using measurements based on traditional morphology as well as on DNA barcoding. The COI barcode showed an average interspecific K2P distance of , which is about four times larger than the mean intraspecific distance (). Using six diversity indices, we did not detect any significant differences in estimated species diversity between measurements based on traditional morphology and on DNA barcoding. Furthermore, we found strong positive correlations between them, indicating that barcode-based measures of species diversity can serve as a good surrogate for morphology-based measures in most situations tested. Eastern communities were found to have significantly higher diversity than Western ones. Among 22 environmental factors tested, we found that three (precipitation of driest month, precipitation of driest quarter, and precipitation of coldest quarter) were significantly correlated with species diversity. Our results indicate that these factors could be the key ecological factors influencing the species diversity of the lepidopteran family Noctuidae on the Tibetan plateau.

Systematics and biology of some species of Micrurapteryx Spuler (Lepidoptera, Gracillariidae) from the Holarctic Region, with re-description of M. caraganella (Hering) from Siberia

“…In conclusion, our study documents another example of how DNA barcoding can help to reveal overlooked species and clarify taxonomic issues (Jin et al 2013; Landry et al 2013; Lees et al 2013; Mutanen et al 2013; Huemer et al 2014). Moreover, our analysis highlights the need for a careful revision of Parectopa and Micrurapteryx in the Nearctic and Palearctic Regions, particularly in the context of a broader phylogenetic analysis of the Gracillariidae.…”

BarcodingR: an integrated r package for species identification using DNA barcodes

“…Additionally, function barcoding.spe.identify provides species identification using Bayesian approach as well (Jin et al . ).…”

“…; Hao, Jiang & Chen ; Jin et al . ). Choosing one of these options (‘fuzzyId’, ‘bpNewTraining’ and ‘Bayesian’) of the r function of barcoding.spe.identify can perform any of these identifications.…”

“…), Bayesian‐based method (Jin et al . ), given reference and query DNA sequences. Correspondingly, barcoding.spe.identify contains the following options: bpNewTraining/bpNewTrainingOnly/bpUseTrained .…”

“…) and Bayesian species identification (Jin et al . ), and new/updated functions variously useful in barcode study such as barcode evaluation, kmer optimization (Kuksa & Pavlovic ; Polychronopoulos et al . ; Weitschek, Cunial & Felici ), DNA barcode gap analysis, species membership analysis, delimitation comparison analysis and consensus identification.…”