Experimental Methodology for Investigating environmental DNA traces Spreading in Rivers

The biomonitoring of ecosystems is a key operation for evaluating the status of conservation or restauration of biodiversity. Recently, sampling of environmental DNA (eDNA) was evaluated as a promising tool for the future biomonitoring campaigns. For its application many studies have been performed for evaluating the amount of genetic material released by single species and the persistence of this information in static water environments, as ponds or lakes. Here, we demonstrate that more investigations are needed for evaluating the relevance of the transport of eDNA traces over the other parameters. In particular, we believe that the transport is relevant in all environments governed by high Reynolds numbers, because the advection processes will cause the drift of the traces. For this reason, we here publicize an experimental campaign planned for investigating the trace drift and the eventual breaking of the eDNA traces.