PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Gottschling, Marc AU - Czech, Lucas AU - Mahé, Frédéric AU - Adl, Sina AU - Dunthorn, Micah TI - The windblown: possible explanations for dinophyte DNA in forest soils AID - 10.1101/2020.08.07.242388 DP - 2020 Jan 01 TA - bioRxiv PG - 2020.08.07.242388 4099 - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/08/10/2020.08.07.242388.short 4100 - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/08/10/2020.08.07.242388.full AB - Dinophytes are widely distributed in marine- and fresh-waters, but have yet to be conclusively documented in terrestrial environments. Here we evaluated the presence of these protists from an environmental DNA metabarcoding dataset of Neotropical rainforest soils. Using a phylogenetic placement approach with a reference alignment and tree, we showed that the numerous sequencing reads that were assigned to the dinophytes did not associate with taxonomy, environmental preference, nutritional mode, or dormancy. All the dinophytes in the soils are most likely windblown dispersal units of aquatic species, and are not biologically active residents of terrestrial environments.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.