Environmental DNA illuminates the darkness of mesophotic assemblages of fishes from West Indian Ocean.

ABSTRACT: The advent of environmental DNA (eDNA) represents a pivotal advancement in probing mesophotic communities, offering a non-intrusive avenue for studying marine biodiversity at greater depths. Using this approach, we characterized and compared the mesophotic reef fish assemblages of two West Indian Ocean islands, Mayotte and La Réunion, which are characterized by different geo-morphological contexts. The sequences obtained were assigned taxonomically and grouped into molecular operational taxonomic units to perform richness and beta diversity analyses. The functional diversity of the assemblages was assessed using five traits, enabling each sequence to be assigned to a functional entity corresponding to a specific trait combination. On both islands, the fish assemblages exhibited a comparabl

SUBMITTER: Corse E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12097626 | biostudies-literature | 2025

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature