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Interspecific hybridization is an important evolutionary process, which has significant influence on the diversity within and between participating taxa. Although interspecific hybridization in terrestrial and freshwater organisms has been subjected to many detailed studies, studies in marine realm have been limited in terms of both numbers and detail. In this study, the potential for interspecific hybridization between two rockfishes, Sebastes vulpes and S. zonatus, occurring in the western North Pacific, was assessed on the basis of 177 specimens collected from three sampling localities within the main geographic distribution of both species, and analysed using a combination of amplified fragment length polymorphisms (AFLP), mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) markers and morphometric characters. Bayesian-based individual genetic assignment based on 364 AFLP loci detected a total of 63 (35.6%) hybrid specimens in the data set, the presence of interspecific hybrids also being rigorously supported by mtDNA analysis using partial sequences from the control region and morphological analysis based on 31 morphometric characters. Hybrids from all three localities were found, showing a common pattern of biased introgression across the localities whereby hybrids were more closely related to S. zonatus than to S. vulpes. Apart from this common pattern, rates of hybridization varied considerably among the localities, being greater in the northern localities. Variations in the local rates of hybridization were associated with variations in habitat segregation and thermal regime, implying that vertical water temperature regimes determined the extent of habitat segregation of the two species and, accordingly, the opportunity for hybridization.

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