Research Council of Finland supports new revolutionary approach to describe thousands of new species

The Research Council of Finland has granted ca half million euros for a research initiative that develops a novel genomic approach to taxonomically describe tens of thousands of new insect species. The international research team is led by Prof. Marko Mutanen from the University of Oulu, Finland.

The project focusses on the massively diverse and taxonomically extremely ”dark” gall midges (Diptera, Cecidomyiidae). Gall midges serve an ideal model to develop and test the “augmented minimalistic approach” the team has conceptualized. The team aims to design and test an efficient workflow to scientifically describe new species of dark taxa in an unprecedented manner towards the bioliterate future.

Central to the new approach is its heavy reliance on genetic information deriving from DNA barcodes and nuclear markers. All taxonomically relevant information is encoded in species’ DNA, enabling utilisation and automatization of DNA sequence information in classifying organisms into named biological species. This possibility is especially useful for the poorly known, hyperdiverse groups of organisms often referred to as dark taxa. The team members find that for many such groups the morphological methods may not provide a realistic solution.

The 2 million species described during the last 260 years of taxonomic scrutiny represent just a fraction of the species inhabiting our planet. Current estimates of the world’s true species count vary heavily from few millions to tens of millions or even more. Utilization of traditional approaches to describing the remaining majority is becoming increasingly challenging due to multiple reasons – the high number of undescribed species, their tiny size, high morphological similarity and lack of taxonomic expertise.

There is an urgent need of understanding and monitoring biodiversity globally in the midst of the biodiversity crisis.