Abstract
The diversity of insects collected during entomological field courses at the University
of West Papua (UNIPA), Indonesia, is studied using DNA barcoding tools. The results
were compared with public data available for West Papua in the Barcode of Life Data
System. During two training courses in 2013 and 2015, 1,052 specimens of insects were
collected at eight sites near Manokwari in northern West Papua. The DNA sequences
obtained from these specimens were assigned to 311 Barcode Index Numbers (BINs) and
represent species in 27 families of
Lepidoptera
,
Hymenoptera
and
Coleoptera
. Of those BINs, 294 (95%) were new to West Papua. The study suggests that DNA barcoding
applied to university courses achieves several goals, including capacity building
and hands-on experience in molecular biodiversity assessment. In addition, it can
provide valuable biodiversity data that are globally available to researchers for
further studies.
Introduction
Carrying out field courses for students is a central aspect of any capacity building
effort at universities, including and perhaps especially so in tropical countries
(see Basset et al. 2000, Basset et al. 2004, Novotny et al. 2012, Tänzler et al. 2012,
Rintelen et al. 2017). They serve mainly the purpose of demonstrating sampling, preparation
and identification methods for insects and other arthropods. The scientific value
of insect collecting during student courses can be dramatically increased if the specimens
are adequately preserved and/or mounted for long-term storage in a scientific collection
(Lopez-Vaamonde et al. 2012, Schmidt et al. 2017). This applies even more if samples
are then utilised for more sustainable methods of biodiversity assessment, such as
DNA barcode analysis and if sequence and associated collecting data are generally
accessible for researchers nationally and internationally (see Hebert et al. 2003,
Hajibabaei et al. 2005, Janzen et al. 2009, Gwiazdowski et al. 2015, Wirta et al.
2015, Miller et al. 2016).
The present study makes an attempt to use specimens of insects collected during student
courses in a more sustainable way. In particular, we tried to maximise the potential
benefit of field and entomological training courses at the University of West Papua
(UNIPA) on the western part of the island of New Guinea. The courses were conducted
by a team of entomologists from the Zoologische Staatssammlung (ZSM) in Munich, Germany,
which was followed up by a repeated staff exchange from UNIPA to the ZSM.
Material and Methods
The methods were described in Cancian de Araujo et al. (2017), with the following
differences:
Specimen collecting and processing
In 2013 and 2015, 1,052 specimens of insects were collected during capacity building
courses by lecturers and students of the State University of Papua (UNIPA) in Manokwari.
The collections mainly served as a vehicle to demonstrate field survey methods and
subsequent laboratory procedures for sustainable biodiversity inventory and discovery.
Targeted field work was coordinated by RP and AK and part of the laboratory work was
conducted by RP during her stay at the SNSB-Zoologische Staatssammlung München (ZSM,
Bavarian State Collection of Zoology) in 2014 under the supervision of MB, SS and
OS.
Samples were collected at eight sites in the Indonesian province West Papua, viz.
Fumato, Kebar Village, Minyambo, Mubrani, Syoubri, Senopi, Gunung Meja and the Papua
University Campus in Manokwari (Fig. 1). The latter was a short Malaise trapping exercise
with one trap that was operated for three weeks. For more details about the field
and lab protocols see Schmidt et al. (2015), Schmidt et al. (2017) and below. The
specimen data are accessible on BOLD through the following doi: 10.5883/DS-INWPAPUA
and through GenBank (Accession nos MH094885-MH095566),
Data acquisition
The specimen data and result files generated for the present study were downloaded
directly from the Barcode of Life Data Systems (BOLD, http://www.boldsystems.org)
workbench. In addition, all other public records from the province West Papua and
other Indonesian areas from the western half of the island of New Guinea present in
BOLD were obtained through the REST API of the BOLD platform on 31-Jan-2018. We applied
the “Full Data Retrieval” parameters geo=Papua|West%20Papua|Papua%20Barat and marker=COI–5P
in order to gather all public records from West Papua with the standard DNA barcoding
marker (COI–5P).
Data processing
The files that were downloaded contained information on each record including the
Barcode Index Number (BIN), collection data and taxonomy. The data were evaluated
in terms of BIN diversity, spatial distribution of specimens, taxonomic identification
depth and taxonomic diversity. The results were compared in terms of diversity of
BINs, exclusive and shared BINs and BIN distribution. Analyses and comparisons were
made using Microsoft Excel. The number of BINs shared by the two sources was evaluated
and after that, the shared BINs were subtracted from our West Papua list in order
to highlight the contribution of our case study for West Papuan records in general.
The map with collecting records was created using Quantum GIS (vers. 2.8).
Results
Between 2013 and 2015, 1,052 specimens from West Papua were processed. The records
are distributed in six areas in West Papua and were collected at altitudes between
80 and 1,555 meters above sea level. The taxa belong to three insect orders:
Coleoptera
(108),
Hymenoptera
(217) and
Lepidoptera
(727). The geographic distribution per site and taxon are presented in Fig. 1. Out
of these 1,052 specimens, the CO1-5P barcode sequence was recovered from 686 specimens,
corresponding to 311 BINs from at least 27 families of insects (Fig. 2).
When searching for public data of arthropods from West Papua in BOLD, we recovered
1,268 records that were assigned to 584 BINs. The records belong to 10 orders with
the most common being
Lepidoptera
(910 records, 441 BINs),
Coleoptera
(214 records, 68 BINs) and
Decapoda
(60 records, 30 BINs). When comparing our records with the public data available on
BOLD, only 17 BINs (5%) had been recorded before from West Papua, whereas 294 BINs
(95%) were new records for this area in BOLD.
A comparison of BINs recorded in our study that were also recorded from elsewhere
showed that 74 BINs (24%) were already present in BOLD from regions outside of West
Papua, mainly from Australia (39 BINs), Papua New Guinea (23 BINs), French Polynesia
(6 BINs) and Indonesian locations other than West Papua (23 BINs) (Table 1). The species
is given if the BIN was associated with a species (or genus) name in BOLD, but it
should be stressed that, for many species, the barcode-based species level identification
require verification based on morphology by a specialist.
Two taxa,
Spoladea
recurvalis
(
Lepidoptera
,
Crambidae
) and a species of
Cotesia
(
Hymenoptera
,
Braconidae
), had a wider distribution with records from five or more countries (Table 1). The
remaining 237 BINs (76%) were recorded excusively from West Papua.
Discussion
The high number of BINs that are exclusive to an area with comparatively well studied
surroundings, highlights the urgency of studying the biodiversity of tropical regions.
Analysis of 1,052 specimens increased the diversity of known species in this particular
area 1.5-fold, from 583 to 877 species, as expressed by BINs that have been shown
to closely relate to biological species. This was achieved by analysing a handful
of randomly collected samples obtained by students during field courses under the
supervision of entomologists from the ZSM (Munich).
Even for well studied groups like
Lepidoptera
, the study led to an increase of 205 BINs, corresponding to nearly one third (32%)
of all species known so far for this insect order from West Papua. For less well known
groups like
Hymenoptera
and
Coleoptera
, all BINs were new to West Papua. It is important to stress that nearly all
Coleoptera
and
Hymenoptera
specimens of the present study were collected at one site, the campus of the Papua
University at Manokwari, showing the potential for a significantly higher number of
discoveries with a broader sampling regime across different elevations and actually
investigating primary forest areas. The
Geometridae
(
Lepidoptera
) was a target group for collecting which explains the predominance of geometrid moths,
representing nearly half (48%) of the BINs.
Our study suggests that DNA barcoding applied to university courses achieves several
goals, including capacity building, hands-on experience in molecular biodiversity
assessment and it provides valuable data that are globally available by researchers
for further studies (see also Vernooy et al. 2010). Specimens that would usually only
be identified to order or perhaps genus level (and then often forgotten) can now serve
to provide data in a sustainable manner. The data have become a community resource
and are available for local researchers to benefit their research. Ideally, the next
steps would include more focussed and specific project orientated field- and laboratory
work that could strongly support the analysis of large scale patterns of diversity
as outlined by Tänzler et al. (2012).
In a very similar context, DNA barcoding applied to samples obtained through activities
of citizen scientists in remote localities (Janzen and Hallwachs 2011, Miller et al.
2014, Wilson et al. 2015, Jisming-See et al. 2016, Loos et al. 2015, Schilthuizen
et al. 2017, Suprayitno et al. 2017, Freitag et al. 2018) could make significant,
objective contributions to our understanding of the patterns of global biodiversity.
Finally, this simple experiment provided additional occurrence records for virtually
cosmopolitan species like the
Lepidoptera
,
Crambidae
:
Spoladea
recurvalis
and a widespread species of braconid wasps (
Hymenoptera
,
Braconidae
,
Cotesia
sp.), confirming the usefulness of DNA barcoding for the large scale assessment of
global distribution patterns and also for monitoring the distribution and spread of
invasive species.