Current State of DNA Barcoding of Sciaroidea (Diptera)— Highlighting the Need to Build the Reference Library

• Published in: Insects
• Main Author: Kjærandsen, Jostein
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI 2022
• Subjects: Arctic; Norway; Tromsø; Arctic University of Norway; UiT The Arctic University of Norway
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10037/26520; https://doi.org/10.3390/insects13020147

first_page settings Open AccessReview Current State of DNA Barcoding of Sciaroidea (Diptera)—Highlighting the Need to Build the Reference Library by Jostein Kjærandsen [ORCID] The Arctic University Museum of Norway, UiT—The Arctic University of Norway, P.O. Box 6050 Langnes, NO-9037 Tromsø, Norway Academic Editor: Muhammad Ashfaq Insects 2022, 13(2), 147; https://doi.org/10.3390/insects13020147 Received: 6 December 2021 / Revised: 18 January 2022 / Accepted: 27 January 2022 / Published: 29 January 2022 (This article belongs to the Special Issue Diptera Diversity in Space and Time) Download PDF Browse Figures Citation Export Simple Summary DNA barcoding is a method by which a specific region of the mitochondrial genome is used to quantify genetic distances within and between animal species. Most DNA barcodes of the world are assembled on the Barcode of Life online database BoldSystems (BOLD). There, machine-generated barcode index numbers (BINs) are automatically assigned to clusters of specimens thought to represent species. I review the current state of DNA barcoding of the superfamily Sciaroidea, a diverse insect group consisting of close to 16,000 described fly species in eight families. To date, over 1.2 million specimens of Sciaroidea have been barcoded and the 56,648 assigned BINs on BOLD already represent 3.5 times the number of described species. Still, 95% of the BINs have currently no associated scientific name and very little effort has been put into building a quality-checked reference library where named species are linked to the BINs on BOLD. In the Nordic region, however, substantial progress is made towards building a complete reference library. While DNA barcoding has tremendous potential for advancing the knowledge for many diverse groups of insects, its potential will never be fully reached absent more engagement of trained taxonomists to build voucher collections, curate the reference libraries, and describe new species. Abstract DNA barcoding has tremendous potential for advancing species ...