Media release

From: The Royal Society

The bug in a teacup – Monitoring arthropod-plant associations with environmental DNA from dried plant material

Biology Letters

Every organism leaves traces of its DNA in its environment, so-called environmental or eDNA. eDNA can be enriched and sequenced, allowing researchers to characterize biological communities without the need for collecting actual specimens. Here, we introduce a novel approach to recover eDNA of arthropods from dried plant material. From various commercially produced teas and herbs, we recovered diverse arthropod communities totaling over a thousand species. Atypically for eDNA, arthropod DNA in dried plants shows a very high temporal stability, greatly simplifying the monitoring of arthropod communities.

Contact: Dr Henrik Krehenwinkel, Trier University, krehenwinkel@uni-trier.de,

URL after publication: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsbl.2022.0091

• Bug diversi-tea - What can a cup of tea tell us about bug biodiversity? Using a new DNA analysis method, researchers gathered arthropod environmental DNA from dried teas and dried herbs found in supermarkets - chamomile, mint, tea and parsley. They identified over a thousand diverse arthropod species. This technique could be used to trace the origin of illegal plant material confiscated by customs, detect agricultural pests, and monitor arthropods and arthropod– plant interactions.