Executing multi-taxa eDNA ecological assessment via traditional metrics and interactive networks

Abstract Current approaches to ecological assessment are limited by traditional morpho-taxonomic methods presently employed and the inability to meet increasing demands for rapid assessments. Advancements in high throughput sequencing now enable rapid high-resolution ecological assessment using environmental DNA (eDNA). Here we test the ability of using eDNA based assessment methods against traditional assessment of two key indicator groups (diatoms and macroinvertebrates) and show how eDNA across multiple gene regions (COI, rbcL, 12S and 18S) can be used to infer interactive networks that link to ecological assessment criteria. We compared results between taxonomic and eDNA based assessments and found significant positive associations between macroinvertebrate (p