Just keep it simple? Benchmarking the accuracy of taxonomy assignment software in metabarcoding studies

Enhancing Arthropod Diversity and Sorghum Quality in Northern Jiangsu, China: The Benefits of Green Pest Management Revealed Through Metabarcoding

Sorghum is a key global crop with substantial economic importance. Implementing green pest management for sorghum is crucial for promoting ecological balance and reducing reliance on chemical pesticides. This study assesses the impact of green pest management on arthropod biodiversity and sorghum yield and quality. Over two years, using Malaise trapping and DNA metabarcoding, we found that green pest management significantly enhanced arthropod diversity, increasing species richness by 5.63% and shifting species composition, notably increasing the abundance of Hymenoptera. Although sorghum yield metrics were higher in the green group compared to the chemical control group, these differences were not statistically significant. However, the green group exhibited improved quality with lower crude fat (3.63% vs. 4.08% in the chemical control group) and higher levels of crude protein (9.18% vs. 9.13%), starch (73.69% vs. 73.41%), and amylopectin (98.53% vs. 98.34%). These findings underscore the benefits of green pest management in fostering biodiversity and enhancing sorghum quality. Future research should focus on optimizing biodiversity-driven agroecosystem resilience and scaling these strategies across diverse agricultural systems.

rCRUX: A Rapid and Versatile Tool for Generating Metabarcoding Reference libraries in R

The sequencing revolution requires accurate taxonomic classification of DNA sequences. Key to making accurate taxonomic assignments are curated, comprehensive reference barcode databases. However, the generation and curation of such databases has remained challenging given the large and continuously growing volumes of both DNA sequence data and novel reference barcode targets. Monitoring and research applications require a greater diversity of specialized gene regions and targeted taxa then are currently curated by professional staff. Thus there is a growing need for an easy to implement computational tool that can generate comprehensive metabarcoding reference libraries for any bespoke locus. We address this need by reimagining CRUX from the Anacapa Toolkit and present the rCRUX package in R which, like it's predecessor, relies on sequence homology and PCR primer compatibility instead of keyword-searches to avoid limitations of user-defined metadata. The typical workflow involves searching for plausible seed amplicons (get_seeds_local() or get_seeds_remote()) by simulating in silico PCR to acquire a set of sequences analogous to PCR products containing a user-defined set of primer sequences. Next, these seeds are used to iteratively blast search seed sequences against a local copy of the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) formatted nt database using a taxonomic-rank based stratified random sampling approach ( blast_seeds() ). This results in a comprehensive set of sequence matches. This database is dereplicated and cleaned (derep_and_clean_db()) by identifying identical reference sequences and collapsing the taxonomic path to the lowest taxonomic agreement across all matching reads. This results in a curated, comprehensive database of primer-specific reference barcode sequences from NCBI. Databases can then be compared (compare_db()) to determine read and taxonomic overlap. We demonstrate that rCRUX provides more comprehensive reference databases for the MiFish Universal Teleost 12S, Taberlet trnl, fungal ITS, and Leray CO1 loci than CRABS, MetaCurator, RESCRIPt, and ecoPCR reference databases. We then further demonstrate the utility of rCRUX by generating 24 reference databases for 20 metabarcoding loci, many of which lack dedicated reference database curation efforts. The rCRUX package provides a simple to use tool for the generation of curated, comprehensive reference databases for user-defined loci, facilitating accurate and effective taxonomic classification of metabarcoding and DNA sequence efforts broadly.

rCRUX: A Rapid and Versatile Tool for Generating Metabarcoding Reference libraries in R

Key to making accurate taxonomic assignments are curated, comprehensive reference barcode databases. However, the generation and curation of such databases has remained challenging given the large and continuously growing volumes of DNA sequence data and novel reference barcode targets. Monitoring and research applications require a greater diversity of specialized gene regions and targeted taxa to meet taxonomic classification goals then are currently curated by professional staff. Thus, there is a growing need for an easy to implement tool that can generate comprehensive metabarcoding reference libraries for any bespoke locus. We address this need by reimagining CRUX from the Anacapa Toolkit and present the rCRUX package in R. The typical workflow involves searching for plausible seed amplicons (get_seeds_local() or get_seeds_remote()) by simulating in silico PCR to acquire seed sequences containing a user-defined primer set. Next these seeds are used to iteratively blast search seed sequences against a local NCBI formatted database using a taxonomic rank based stratified random sampling approach (blast_seeds()) that results in a comprehensive set of sequence matches. This database is dereplicated and cleaned (derep_and_clean_db()) by identifying identical reference sequences and collapsing the taxonomic path to the lowest taxonomic agreement across all matching reads. This results in a curated, comprehensive database of primer specific reference barcode sequences from NCBI. We demonstrate that rCRUX provides more comprehensive reference databases for the MiFish Universal Teleost 12S, Taberlet trnl, and fungal ITS locus than CRABS, METACURATOR, RESCRIPt, and ECOPCR reference databases. We then further demonstrate the utility of rCRUX by generating 16 reference databases for metabarcoding loci that lack dedicated reference database curation efforts. The rCRUX package provides a simple to use tool for the generation of curated, comprehensive reference databases for user-defined loci, facilitating accurate and effective taxonomic classification of metabarcoding and DNA sequence efforts broadly.

An Environmental DNA Primer for Microbial and Restoration Ecology

Environmental DNA (eDNA) sequencing-DNA collected from the environment from living cells or shed DNA-was first developed for working with microbes and has greatly benefitted microbial ecologists for decades since. These tools have only become increasingly powerful with the advent of metabarcoding and metagenomics. Most new studies that examine diverse assemblages of bacteria, archaea, protists, fungi, and viruses lean heavily into eDNA using these newer technologies, as the necessary sequencing technology and bioinformatic tools have become increasingly affordable and user friendly. However, eDNA methods are rapidly evolving, and sometimes it can feel overwhelming to simply keep up with the basics. In this review, we provide a starting point for microbial ecologists who are new to DNA-based methods by detailing the eDNA methods that are most pertinent, including study design, sample collection and storage, selecting the right sequencing technology, lab protocols, equipment, and a few bioinformatic tools. Furthermore, we focus on how eDNA work can benefit restoration and what modifications are needed when working in this subfield.

The Application of Metagenomics to Study Microbial Communities and Develop Desirable Traits in Fermented Foods

The microbial communities present within fermented foods are diverse and dynamic, producing a variety of metabolites responsible for the fermentation processes, imparting characteristic organoleptic qualities and health-promoting traits, and maintaining microbiological safety of fermented foods. In this context, it is crucial to study these microbial communities to characterise fermented foods and the production processes involved. High Throughput Sequencing (HTS)-based methods such as metagenomics enable microbial community studies through amplicon and shotgun sequencing approaches. As the field constantly develops, sequencing technologies are becoming more accessible, affordable and accurate with a further shift from short read to long read sequencing being observed. Metagenomics is enjoying wide-spread application in fermented food studies and in recent years is also being employed in concert with synthetic biology techniques to help tackle problems with the large amounts of waste generated in the food sector. This review presents an introduction to current sequencing technologies and the benefits of their application in fermented foods.