Phylogenetic position of Antarctic Scalpelliformes (Crustacea: Cirripedia: Thoracica)

Abstract

The phylogenetic relationships of seven Antarctic barnacle species, one verrucomorph and six scalpelliforms from the Scotia, Weddell and Ross seas were investigated using DNA sequences from two nuclear genes (18S and 28S) and one mitochondrial gene (COI), with a combined total length of 3,151 base pairs. Analyses of these new sequences, together with those of previously published ibliform, lepadiform, scalpelliform, balanomorph and verrucomorph species, confirm that the Scalpelliformes are not monophyletic. Bayesian and maximum likelihood analyses consistently recovered a monophyletic group which comprised Ornatoscalpellum stroemii (Sars) and the Southern Ocean scalpellomorphs; Arcoscalpellum sp. from the Weddell Sea, Arcoscalpellum africanum from Elephant Island, A. bouveti from Bouvet Island, the circum-Antarctic Litoscalpellum discoveryi, Litoscalpellum sp. from Shag Rocks and Scalpellum sp. from the Falkland Trough. We also used multiple fossil constraints in a relaxed clock Bayesian framework to estimate divergence times for the 18S+28S phylogeny. Our results indicate a mid Cretaceous divergence for the Weddell Sea Arcoscalpellum sp, followed by a late Cretaceous divergence from the North Atlantic O. stroemii. Subsequent to this, the Antarctic scalpellomorphs began to radiate at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary. Monophyly within the scalpellid genera Arcoscalpellum, Litoscalpellum and Scalpellum was strongly rejected by all loci. Our results show incongruence between taxonomy and molecular systematics and highlight the need for more species to be sequenced as well as taxonomic revisions to resolve uncertainties in the phylogenetic relationships of the stalked barnacles.