Environmental DNA (eDNA) tools must become more accessible and integrated into traditional monitoring so they can enhance ecosystem intelligence in managing Australia’s parks and oceans.
This presentation will advocate for the integration of eDNA tools into a collaborative and effective national marine monitoring framework. The vision is a sustained, integrated monitoring system – with a ‘triage’ layer - where new and existing technologies complement one another.
We estimate there are approximately 10,000 eDNA samples taken from across Australia that focus on metazoans. Minderoo Foundation’s Ocean Discovery and Restoration partnership with Parks Australia, has facilitated analysis of over 6,000 samples - from the Indian Ocean Territories to Tasmania. Exploring eDNA from these sites we will showcase how novel AI-based approaches such as data chatbots, taxonomic classifiers, and clustering algorithms can be used to extract, curate and translate eDNA information. These innovations coupled with visualisation dashboards enable end users to engage with eDNA data, explore species distributions, track biodiversity and ecosystem health trends over time.
Ongoing and new OceanOmics partnerships with IUCN’s Red List, CSIRO (autosamplers and reference databases), visualisation software and eDNA based community programmes collectively set the scene for rapid and continuous improvement of eDNA technologies as a biomonitoring tool.