A green iguana, the world\u2019s smallest otter species and an invasive freshwater jellyfish were among the unexpected discoveries from Curtin University\u2019s BioBlitz at its Perth, Singapore and Malaysia campuses recently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
More than 100 students and staff across the three campuses took part in the 2026 BioBlitz, racing to identify as many species as possible by testing air, water and surface samples for environmental DNA (eDNA)<\/a> shed by organisms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Across the three campuses, the samples identified 572 unique species from the detection of 26,572 distinct DNA sequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These included an invasive freshwater jellyfish in a Perth koi pond and, in Singapore, a lesser short-nosed fruit bat, common tree shrew, Asian glossy starling, pied imperial-pigeon and invasive red-eared slider turtles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The plantain squirrel was the most frequently detected mammal in Singapore, appearing in 13 of 15 campus samples, while the detection of Asian small-clawed otter eDNA in a campus pond was among the survey\u2019s more surprising findings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Malaysia, a water sample detected an invasive common green iguana believed to be an escaped or released pet as the species is not native to the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Data science lead Dr Samuel Thompson, from Curtin’s School of Molecular and Life Sciences<\/a>, said turning more than 26,000 DNA sequences into a reliable species list required careful bioinformatic analysis and cross-checking against global reference databases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Every sample gives us thousands of tiny genetic fragments, and the challenge is sorting the true signals from the noise so we can say with confidence what’s living on our campuses,” Dr Thompson said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We’ve made the results publicly available through the eDNA Viewer<\/a>, so students, staff and the wider community can explore what was found on each campus and see how biodiversity compares across Perth, Singapore and Malaysia over the years.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n