Irene Santos-Perdomo, PhD candidate at the SoilEvoEcoLab, has led the paper: Towards a Canary Islands barcode database for soil biodiversity: revealing cryptic and unrecorded mite species diversity within insular soils, recently published in Biodiversity Data Journal. This research study, which constitutes the first chapter of Santos-Perdomo’s Thesis, establishes the basis for the Canary Islands Soil Biodiversity barcode database (CISoilBiota), a comprehensive repository of genetic data from soil-dwelling arthropods from this biodiversity hotspot. The research team has optimised a molecular-morphology hybrid protocol adapted to soil mesofauna and, as a proof of concept, has generated and analysed a collection of 168 barcode sequences from mites across the archipelago. Using this data, the team has revealed high levels of cryptic and unrecorded diversity within both regional (Biodiversity Data Bank of the Canary Islands) and global biodiversity databases (Barcode of Life Database). Santos-Perdomo’s thesis, funded by the Agencia Canaria de Investigación, Innovación y Sociedad de la Información (ACIISI)) and developed in collaboration with the Genomic Area of the Instituto Tecnológico y de Energías Renovables (ITER), is focussed on the development and implementation of high-throughput approaches to catalogue soil biodiversity, and aims to set the stage for comprehensive biodiversity assessments and conservation efforts across the Canary Islands.