Suebsuya Thanaporn, Madesis Panagiotis, Suwannapoom Chatmongkon, Osathanunkul Maslin
Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand.
Institute of Applied Biosciences, Centre for Research & Technology Hellas (CERTH), Thessaloniki, Greece.
PLoS One. 2025 Jun 24;20(6):e0326215. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0326215. eCollection 2025.
Physalia sp. is among the world's most hazardous marine species, posing a significant threat to public safety and Thailand's tourism sector. Traditional survey methods such as trawling and netting are time-consuming, potentially disruptive to marine ecosystems, and often lack the precision needed for effective monitoring. This study employed environmental DNA (eDNA) analysis to investigate the distribution of Physalia sp. across 45 sampling sites in eight provinces along the Gulf of Thailand. Using species-specific primers and probes targeting the COI region, we successfully detected Physalia sp. eDNA in four provinces: Chonburi, Rayong, Chumphon, and Songkhla. Notably, high eDNA concentrations were observed in Songkhla province, correlating with direct beach observations and public health warnings. The detection in Chumphon province represents a previously undocumented distribution area for this species in Thailand. Bayesian occupancy modeling revealed moderate true-positive detection rates for field samples (θ11 = 0.627) and high rates for qPCR replicates (p11 = 0.9), with notably low false-positive probabilities (θ10 = 0.008, p10 = 0.01), demonstrating the reliability of our eDNA-based approach. These findings demonstrate the utility of eDNA technology as a non-invasive, sensitive tool for monitoring hazardous marine species, with important implications for public safety and marine ecosystem management.
僧帽水母是世界上最危险的海洋物种之一，对公众安全和泰国旅游业构成重大威胁。传统的调查方法，如拖网和张网，既耗时，又可能对海洋生态系统造成破坏，而且往往缺乏有效监测所需的精度。本研究采用环境DNA（eDNA）分析方法，调查僧帽水母在泰国湾沿岸八个省份的45个采样点的分布情况。使用针对细胞色素氧化酶亚基I（COI）区域的物种特异性引物和探针，我们在春武里、罗勇、春蓬和宋卡四个省份成功检测到了僧帽水母的eDNA。值得注意的是，在宋卡省观察到高浓度的eDNA，这与直接的海滩观测结果和公共卫生警告相关。在春蓬省的检测结果表明，该物种在泰国的分布区域此前未被记录。贝叶斯占有率模型显示，现场样本的真阳性检测率适中（θ11 = 0.627），qPCR重复样本的真阳性检测率较高（p11 = 0.9），假阳性概率极低（θ10 = 0.008，p10 = 0.01），这证明了我们基于eDNA的方法的可靠性。这些发现证明了eDNA技术作为一种用于监测危险海洋物种的非侵入性、灵敏工具的实用性，对公共安全和海洋生态系统管理具有重要意义。
