A sedimentary eDNA record of the Atacama Trench reveals biodiversity changes in the most productive marine ecosystem

The hadopelagic environment remains highly understudied due to the inherent difficulties in sampling at these depths. The use of sediment eDNA can overcome some of these restrictions as settled and preserved DNA represent an archive of the biological communities. We use sediment eDNA to assess changes in the community within one of the world’s most productive open ocean ecosystems: the Atacama Trench. The ecosystems around the Atacama Trench have been intensively fished and are affected by climate oscillations, but the understanding of potential impacts on the marine community is limited. We sampled five sites using sediment cores at water depths from 2400 to ~8000m. The chronologies of the sedimentary record were determined using 210Pbex. Environmental DNA was extracted from core slices and metabarcoding was used to identify the eukaryote community using two separate primer pairs for different sections of the 18S rDNA gene (V9 and V7) effectively targeting pelagic taxa.  The reconstruc..., , , # Atacama Trench sedDNA community dataset

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.66t1g1k92](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.66t1g1k92)

Data obtained from sedDNA collection in the Atacama Trench. Two different kinds of datasets are presented. 

1.- Sample data (Atacama18sMiniFinalSampledataCorrected and AtacamaEuka02FinalSampleDataCorrected) from each of the different layers of the sediment cores utilized for analyses. Each layer is interpreted as a unique eDNA sample. 

2.- Taxonomic tables (18SAtacama_TaxaFinal and AtacamaTaxaEuka02Final) according to the v7 and v9 primers respectively, from Kingdom to Species. Contains information about whether the individual is primarily pelagic or benthic in its adult stage and the reference consulted for said information. 

## Description of the data and file structure

Taxonomic data tables include the different taxa identified by sedDNA sequencing, down to the species level if possible, as well as the sequence from where this taxonomic data was obtained....