Assessing DNA Barcodes for Identification of Pufferfish Species (Tetraodontidae) in Turkish Marine Waters

Mevlüt Gürlek,Deniz Ergüden,Serpil Karan,Ali Uyan,Servet Ahmet Doğdu,Cemal Turan

doi:10.28978/nesciences.369538

Abstract

In Turkish marine waters, pufferfish belongs to Tetraondontidae family are represented with 8 species, Lagocephalus lagocephalus, L. sceleratus, L. spadiceus, L. suezensis, L. guentheri, Sphoeroides pachygaster, Torquigener flavimaculosus and Tylerius spinosissimus. DNA barcoding can be useful in the assessment of cryptic or morphologically similar species of identification which is widespread in marine environment. DNA barcode identification of the eight puffer species of the Tetraodontidae family in Turkish marine waters were examined by using mtDNA sequencing of the amplified partial mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase I (COI) gene. COI contained 189 variable and 337 conservative nucleotides of which 183 were parsimony informative over 526 bp. Mean genetic diversity all species was found 0.18164. The highest and lowest nucleotide divergence was observed L.spadiceus (0.0022) and between L. sceleratus, L. suezensis, L. lagocephalus, L. guentheri and S. pachygaster (0.0000) respectively. The number of detected different haplotypes were 10 out of 23 sequences, and haplotype diversity was found to be 1.000.&nbsp;

Highlights

Pufferfishes are marine fish species that are distributed in tropical and subtropical areas of the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Ocean
Lagocephalus lagocephalus, L. sceleratus, L. spadiceus, L. suezensis, L. guentheri and Torquigener flavimaculosus, were collected from Iskenderun Bay, and the others Sphoeroides pachygaster and Tylerius spinosissimus sequences taken from GenBank (S. pachygaster: JQ681814.1, JF494545.1, KJ709636.1- T. spinosissimus: JQ681847.1, KP266781.1, JQ681456.1).All species showed that Figure.1.All samples were put in plastic bags individually and frozen at -20 °C till they were transported to the laboratory
DNA barcoding of eight pufferfish species which are distributed in the Turkish marine waters were investigated

Summary

Introduction

Pufferfishes are marine fish species that are distributed in tropical and subtropical areas of the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Ocean. Puffers include 28 genera and approximately 184 species in all over the world marine waters within the Tetraodontidae family (Matsuura, 2015; Farrag et al, 2016), among which at least ten are found in the eastern Mediterranean (Farrag, 2014). This Lessepsian invasive species has established large populations along the coasts of many countries of the eastern basin such as Israel, Lebanon, Turkey (Mediterranean and Aegean coasts), Cyprus and Greece (Aegean and Ionian coasts), while still rapidly expanding westwards along the coasts of Egypt, Libya, and along the entire Tunisian coastline (Soussi et al 2014). Tetrodotoxin is a very potent neurotoxin and one of the strongest marine paralytic toxins (El-Sayed et al, 2003; Sato et al, 2008)

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Methods

Conclusion