Coupling remote sensing and eDNA to monitor environmental impact: A pilot to quantify the environmental benefits of sustainable agriculture in the Brazilian Amazon

Monitoring is essential to ensure that environmental goals are being achieved, including those of sustainable agriculture. Growing interest in environmental monitoring provides an opportunity to improve monitoring practices. Approaches that directly monitor land cover change and biodiversity annually by coupling the wall-to-wall coverage from remote sensing and the site-specific community composition from environmental DNA (eDNA) can provide timely, relevant results for parties interested in the success of sustainable agricultural practices. To ensure that the measured impacts are due to the environmental projects and not exogenous factors, sites where projects have been implemented should be benchmarked against counterfactuals (no project) and control (natural habitat) sites. Results can then be used to calculate diverse sets of indicators customized to monitor different projects. Here, we report on our experience developing and applying one such approach to assess the impact of shaded cocoa projects implemented by the Instituto de Manejo e Certificação Florestal e Agrícola (IMAFLORA) near São Félix do Xingu, in Pará, Brazil. We used the Continuous Degradation Detection (CODED) and LandTrendr algorithms to create a remote sensing-based assessment of forest disturbance and regeneration, estimate carbon sequestration, and changes in essential habitats. We coupled these remote sensing methods with eDNA analyses using arthropod-targeted primers by collecting soil samples from intervention and counterfactual pasture field sites and a control secondary forest. We used a custom set of indicators from the pilot application of a coupled monitoring framework called TerraBio. Our results suggest that, due to IMAFLORA's shaded cocoa projects, over 400 acres were restored in the intervention area and the community composition of arthropods in shaded cocoa is closer to second-growth forests than that of pastures. In reviewing the coupled approach, we found multiple aspects worked well, and we conclude by presenting multiple lessons learned.

A multiplexed RT-PCR assay for nanopore whole genome sequencing of Tilapia lake virus (TiLV)

Tilapia lake virus (TiLV) is a highly contagious viral pathogen that affects tilapia, a globally significant and affordable source of fish protein. To prevent the introduction and spread of TiLV and its impact, there is an urgent need for increased surveillance, improved biosecurity measures, and continuous development of effective diagnostic and rapid sequencing methods. In this study, we have developed a multiplexed RT-PCR assay that can amplify all ten complete genomic segments of TiLV from various sources of isolation. The amplicons generated using this approach were immediately subjected to real-time sequencing on the Nanopore system. By using this approach, we have recovered and assembled 10 TiLV genomes from total RNA extracted from naturally TiLV-infected tilapia fish, concentrated tilapia rearing water, and cell culture. Our phylogenetic analysis, consisting of more than 36 TiLV genomes from both newly sequenced and publicly available TiLV genomes, provides new insights into the high genetic diversity of TiLV. This work is an essential steppingstone towards integrating rapid and real-time Nanopore-based amplicon sequencing into routine genomic surveillance of TiLV, as well as future vaccine development.

Epidemiology of leptospirosis in Tanzania: A review of the current status, serogroup diversity and reservoirs

Background

Tanzania is among the tropical countries of Sub-Saharan Africa with the environmental conditions favorable for transmission of Leptospira. Leptospirosis is a neglected zoonotic disease, and although there are several published reports from Tanzania, the epidemiology, genetic diversity of Leptospira and its host range are poorly understood.

Methods

We conducted a comprehensive review of human and animal leptospirosis within the 26 regions of the Tanzanian mainland. Literature searches for the review were conducted in PubMed and Google Scholar. We further manually identified studies from reference lists among retrieved studies from the preliminary search.

Results

We identified thirty-four studies describing leptospirosis in humans (n = 16), animals (n = 14) and in both (n = 4). The number of studies varied significantly across regions. Most of the studies were conducted in Morogoro (n = 16) followed by Kilimanjaro (n = 9) and Tanga (n = 5). There were a range of study designs with cross-sectional prevalence studies (n = 18), studies on leptospirosis in febrile patients (n = 13), a case control study in cattle (n = 1) and studies identifying novel serovars (n = 2). The most utilized diagnostic tool was the microscopic agglutination test (MAT) which detected antibodies to 17 Leptospira serogroups in humans and animals. The Leptospira serogroups with the most diverse hosts were Icterohaemorrhagiae (n = 11), Grippotyphosa (n = 10), Sejroe (n = 10), Pomona (n = 9) and Ballum (n = 8). The reported prevalence of Leptospira antibodies in humans ranged from 0.3–29.9% and risk factors were associated with occupational animal contact. Many potential reservoir hosts were identified with the most common being rodents and cattle.

Conclusion

Leptospirosis is prevalent in humans and animals in Tanzania, although there is regional and host variation in the reports. Many regions do not have information about the disease in either humans or their animal reservoirs. More studies are required to understand human leptospirosis determinants and the role of livestock in leptospirosis transmission to humans for the development of appropriate control strategies.

Bacteria from the genus Leptospira is an important agent for causing a disease called leptospirosis in humans and a range of animal species. Leptospirosis is often under-recognized as it presents varied symptoms that mimic malaria, typhoid, brucellosis and other diseases. More than 250 pathogenic Leptospira serovars are known to cause leptospirosis in humans and animals. The diversity of Leptospira serovars and their distribution in humans and animals is little defined in Tanzania. We conducted a systematic review to gather information on the diversity of Leptospira serovars with their reservoir distribution and the most common diagnostics methods used. We included studies (n = 34) in the review and found 17 serogroups described in 28 studies that utilized microscopic agglutination test (MAT). So far human and other animal hosts including cattle, dogs, pigs, bats, buffalo, fish, rodents, goats, lion, zebra, sheep and shrews have been investigated for leptospirosis in Tanzania. Our results show that cattle and rodents are likely to be important reservoirs of pathogenic Leptospira spp. and can be a source of human leptospirosis principally in the farming system. Further studies are needed to explore predominant serovars in livestock for the development of prevention strategies to reduce transmission and risks in humans.

How to measure, report and verify soil carbon change to realize the potential of soil carbon sequestration for atmospheric greenhouse gas removal

There is growing international interest in better managing soils to increase soil organic carbon (SOC) content to contribute to climate change mitigation, to enhance resilience to climate change and to underpin food security, through initiatives such as international '4p1000' initiative and the FAO's Global assessment of SOC sequestration potential (GSOCseq) programme. Since SOC content of soils cannot be easily measured, a key barrier to implementing programmes to increase SOC at large scale, is the need for credible and reliable measurement/monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) platforms, both for national reporting and for emissions trading. Without such platforms, investments could be considered risky. In this paper, we review methods and challenges of measuring SOC change directly in soils, before examining some recent novel developments that show promise for quantifying SOC. We describe how repeat soil surveys are used to estimate changes in SOC over time, and how long-term experiments and space-for-time substitution sites can serve as sources of knowledge and can be used to test models, and as potential benchmark sites in global frameworks to estimate SOC change. We briefly consider models that can be used to simulate and project change in SOC and examine the MRV platforms for SOC change already in use in various countries/regions. In the final section, we bring together the various components described in this review, to describe a new vision for a global framework for MRV of SOC change, to support national and international initiatives seeking to effect change in the way we manage our soils.