New technology removes the barriers for species identification of difficult groups

New technology removes the barriers for species identification of difficult groups

New technology removes the "frustration" for species identification of difficult groups New technology removes the "frustration" for species identification of difficult groups

Science and Technology Daily reporter Zhao Hanbin

Science and Technology Daily reporter Zhao Hanbin

The rapid and accurate identification of species is a major challenge for biodiversity research
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Reporters on the 15th from the Keyuan Kunming Institute of Botany was informed that the researchers used genome sequencing shallow, made important progress in the application of research to identify groups of species difficult

Zhong ASTRI ASTRI

In the past ten years, the introduction of DNA barcoding technology has largely alleviated the problem of difficult group species identification
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The shallow genome sequencing technology can obtain the whole plastid genome and nuclear genome ribosomal DNA sequence, which is considered to be an effective means to improve the species identification rate, but there are still few studies to explore the extent to which it can be used in practical applications and how to improve species identification Rate

Recently, the team of Gao Lianming and Li Dezhu of the Kunming Institute of Botany cooperated with Peter Hollingsworth of the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, UK, and extensively sampled rhododendrons mainly distributed in the Himalayas and Hengduan Mountains, and obtained 218 species of 145 species.
Individual shallow genomic data to explore the application of shallow genomic sequencing technology in the identification of Rhododendron species
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"Rhododendron is the largest genus of seed plants in China, with about 590 species
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The Himalayas and the Hengduan Mountains are one of the origin and differentiation centers of Rhododendrons, and there are more than 320 species distributed

The results of the study showed that in the genus Rhododendron, the plastid genome and ribosomal DNA sequences obtained based on shallow genome sequencing can successfully identify 55% of the species, and the species identification rate has increased by 22% compared with the original
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The main reason is that the plastid genome sequence can provide more information, which can significantly improve the identification rate of similar difficult groups

As the shallow genome sequencing technology matures and the cost is reduced, compared with the first generation of barcodes, this technology can be better applied to difficult taxa like Rhododendrons, and can also be used as an extension and upgrade of standard barcodes to enrich standard barcodes.
Reference database
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This research reinforces the importance of nuclear genome data in species identification