| Salmonids are keystone species of freshwaters, playing key roles in ecological dynamics (inc. predators and prey) and nutrient cycling, whilst providing socio-economically important ecosystem services (e.g. tourism, angling and well-being). The contribution of freshwater fish to the UK economy is estimated at £1.7 billion, but salmonid population sizes are declining, associated with habitat loss, environmental change and multiple physicochemical stressors in the forms of organic and inorganic chemicals, pharmaceuticals and plastic pollution. Environmental degradation causes stress in salmonids, opening routes of infection from a plethora of viral, microbial, and fungal pathogens and eukaryotic parasites, some of which can be targeted by specific, individual molecular methods of detection. In order to capture many targets simultaneously, multi-marker or metagenomic aqueous eDNA analyses offer potential solutions, but outstanding questions revolve around sequence coverage, physical capture approaches and bioinformatic pipelines to accurately assess the prevalence of salmonid diseases in the wild. The aim of this project is the development of a multi-species, molecular, digital detection toolkit, that can be deployed throughout the river Conwy catchment and RED-Alert partner rivers, to understand the spatio-temporal dynamics of salmonids, disease and health. |