Molecular sequencing and morphological analysis of a nematode community

Although nematode community analysis is widely quoted as a useful environmental indicator, a major impediment to its wider adoption is the morphological identification of individual nematodes. Problems of taxonomy and throughput could potentially be overcome using molecular biological techniques. This study combined morphological and molecular sequencing to establish the potential for analysing nematode communities by molecular biological characterisation. Nematodes were extracted from an arable soil and the extracted nematode community divided into two for simultaneous morphological and molecular analysis. Samples were proportionately dominated (>10%) by Hoplolaimidae, Telotylenchidae, Cephalobidae and Pratylenchus, volumetrically dominated (>20%) by Anatonchus and Aporcelaimellus and genetically (>10%) dominated by sequence types clustering with Aporcelaimellus, Clarkus and Anatonchus. Nematodes from the Rhabditida and Tylenchida were under-represented in the molecular characterisation, a problem which needs to be overcome to enable routine molecular characterisation of nematode communities.