fundamentals of eDNA

Thanks everyone for a great discussion today! It was awesome to hear your ideas and critiques regarding the paper, and on the impact of SPM and sediment in general. As many of you did, I had questions and reservations about the methods used in this study, and am interested to see the ways that the science behind it advances in coming years. In particular, I wondered about some of the details of field sampling (ie controlling for contamination, specific locations of sediment traps, etc) and what kind of temporal resolution one can achieve with this method. For example, how long does it take for DNA to shed and bind to particles, and how long is it actually retained? I’d also like to see further validation of this method and additional comparisons between it and traditional sampling techniques. That being said, I am really intrigued by this idea of extracting eDNA from SPM, and am curious to see it develop. I also appreciated their use of existing sampling regimes to ask new questions, it’s always nice to see creativity in how we use our resources, time, and effort.

As nerve-wracking as it sometimes is to think of all the ways that people will likely tear apart my own future work, there is something really helpful and nice about having these critical discussions with you all. It helps me learn to anticipate holes in my thought processes, remember the weaknesses in various methods, and think of ways to be more thorough.