Abstract:DNA fingerprinting structure of benthic eukaryotic community and its relations to environmental physical and chemical factors in sea cucumber culture ponds were studied. The DNA fingerprinting structure was measured using PCR-DGGE technique and the physical and chemical factors of sea cucumber ponds were analyzed with general methods. Then the relationship were assessed with cluster analysis. The number of amplified DGGE bands for adult sea cucumber in three culture ponds and juveniles in two ponds were 26, 25, 25 and 20, 20 respectively, which indicated that the ponds culturing adult sea cucumber had richer eukaryotic-diversity. Physical and chemical factors including chlorophyll content, total phosphorus, total nitrogen and dissolved oxygen in sea cucumber culture ponds were 2.037~5.383 μg/L, 0.016~0.039 mg/L, 1.863~3.562 mg/L, 4.06~6.18 mg/L, respectively. All of the physical and chemical factor values in ponds culturing adult sea cucumber were higher than that of ponds culturing juvenile sea cucumber. The result of cluster analysis of environmental physical and chemical factors was similar with that of the benthic eukaryotic community based on PCR-DGGE, which suggested that the benthic eukaryotic community was closely associated with the physical and chemical factors in sea cucumber ponds.
