Monitoring world biodiversity with cutting edge science 

Given the threats to biodiversity from pollution, climate change, and habitat destruction, there has never been a greater need for the biomonitoring of our planet. 

Our scientists had a hunch – what if we could use data captured to monitor air quality and put it to use for another purpose, assessing the biodiversity of a region? 

Using existing data from air quality networks, we forged an international collaboration to draw out critical information about the variety of species in specific regions based on eDNA, which is DNA from species that is airborne and present in the environment.  

In 2024 NPL’s Air Quality team won the Royal Society of Chemistry’s Technical Excellence prize. We spoke to James Allerton, a scientist in the team, to find out more about the project and its success 

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When they told us they’d detected about 180 different species, it was a genuine “Wow!” moment, and proved that the efforts had paid off.

James Allerton 

James, your work sounds fascinating, tell us more. 

This was a truly international collaboration spanning a number of years. In 2022 we provided our biologist collaborators with a set of historical air quality filter samples from the Auchencorth Moss station near Edinburgh and a set of filters from tests conducted with a non-network sampler based here at NPL’s Teddington site. After conducting eDNA analysis of our filters, the York University, Toronto Canada, Elizabeth Clare from York University, Toronto Canada and Joanne Littlefair from QMUL (now UCL), reported back to us that ~180 species had been detected from a variety of animals, plants, fungi, and insects. In 2023 we published in Current Biology a Correspondence article reporting our results – and importantly, the idea that air quality networks could potentially support global biodiversity monitoring efforts. The response was extraordinary: interviews with the co-authors, multiple media outlets reporting and discussing the article in different countries around the world. 

How did you and NPL get involved? 

It was a case of being in the right place at the right time. In January 2022, our current collaborators (biologists Elizabeth Clare and Joanne Littlefair) had published a paper on their successful attempt to capture airborne animal eDNA on filters. After reading a publicity article about their study, I wondered if the filters we deploy on UK-based air quality networks were also capturing airborne eDNA as an accidental by-product. After contacting Elizabeth Clare, we decided to collaborate with her and her colleague Joanne Littlefair, and other participants. Without NPL’s management of air quality networks for the UK government and our team of scientists who operate the facilities for conducting aerosol science in the AES department, we wouldn’t have been able to do the work. 

It’s great to hear you had an extraordinary response! What is eDNA and how can it be used? 

eDNA comes from cellular material released into the atmosphere by organisms including animals, insects, plants, and fungi and we have now shown that it can be detected on filters from aerosol samplers typically used in air quality networks.

It gives us information on what species are present in a particular region without the need for us to directly observe them. 

 

This feels like a big breakthrough for biomonitoring?

Biologists have a range of methods for biodiversity monitoring, including the traditional methods of field campaigns conducted by experts in species identification. Technologies currently used for biomonitoring include aquatic eDNA analysis as a tool used to assess the biodiversity of habitats such as rivers and lakes.

Our collaborators working in biological sciences tell us that monitoring terrestrial biodiversity at country/continent-wide scales across time has been a challenge for decades – eDNA being inadvertently captured on filters from air quality networks is a potential treasure trove of new information for biodiversity research. 

Any surprises along the way?

The most surprising part was just how many different species our biologist collaborators told us had been detected from the filters we’d provided for the pilot study. Neither I nor any of my colleagues are biologists, and so we had no preconceptions about which and how many species would be detected on the filters we supplied – when they told us they’d detected about 180 different species, it was a genuine “Wow!” moment, and proved that the efforts had paid off.

What is next?

Although our initial study shows what’s possible, the next challenge is to rigorously validate airborne eDNA capture/analysis for use as a new biomonitoring tool – this of course is where we can really apply our expertise. In fact, as a follow-up to the pilot study, we have recently secured UKRI/NERC funding for a multi-collaborator project to assess various aerosol samplers, which sample particles in the air, for environmental biomonitoring through eDNA capture.

If you think about the number of air quality networks around the world, and how many filters are being regularly collected from monitoring stations on those networks, the potential eDNA dataset has barely been tapped. Beyond air quality networks, you could set up air samplers specifically to capture eDNA in habitats of conservation interest or monitor for pathogens which affect human health or agricultural production. 

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