After continents divide: comparative phylogeography of reef fishes from theRedSea andIndianOcean

Abstract

Aim The Red Sea is a biodiversity hotspot characterized by a unique marine fauna and high endemism. This sea began forming c. 24 million years ago with the separation of the African and Arabian plates, and has been characterized by periods of desiccation, hypersalinity and intermittent connection to the Indian Ocean. We aim to evaluate the impact of these events on the genetic architecture of the Red Sea reef fish fauna.Location Red Sea and Western Indian Ocean. MethodsWe surveyed seven reef fish species from the Red Sea and adjacent Indian Ocean using mitochondrial DNA cytochrome c oxidase subunit I and cytochrome b sequences. To assess genetic variation and evolutionary connectivity within and between these regions, we estimated haplotype diversity (h) and nucleotide diversity (p), reconstructed phylogenetic relationships among haplotypes, and estimated gene flow and time of population separation using Bayesian coalescent-based methodology.Results Our analyses revealed a range of scenarios from shallow population structure to diagnostic differences that indicate evolutionary partitions and possible cryptic species. Conventional molecular clocks and coalescence analyses indicated time-frames for divergence between these bodies of water ranging from 830,000 years to contemporary exchange or recent range expansion. Colonization routes were bidirectional, with some species moving from the Indian Ocean to the Red Sea compared with expansion out of the Red Sea for other species.Main conclusions We conclude that: (1) at least some Red Sea reef fauna survived multiple salinity crises; (2) endemism is higher in the Red Sea than previously reported; and (3) the Red Sea is an evolutionary incubator, occasionally contributing species to the adjacent Indian Ocean. The latter two conclusionselevated endemism and species exportindicate a need for enhanced conservation priorities for the Red Sea.

Exploring seascape genetics and kinship in the reef sponge Stylissa carteri in the Red Sea

“…1992; Randall 1994; Cox and Moore 2000; DiBattista et al. 2013), its extreme salinity (37–42‰), and temperature ranges (20–32°C) (Raitsos et al. 2011).…”

Species delimitation in the coral genus Goniopora (Scleractinia, Poritidae) from the Saudi Arabian Red Sea

“…Although widespread in the Indo-Pacific (Veron, 2000), the genus remained understudied except for two recent works by Kitano et al (2013Kitano et al ( , 2014 that investigated the phylogenetic relationships of several species with a particular focus on specimens from Japan. This is the first work using molecular approaches to the biodiversity of the genus within an underexplored and species-rich region such as the Red Sea, where a wide range of marine organisms are increasingly being investigated using combined morpho-molecular data (e.g., HaverkortYeh et al, 2013;DiBattista et al, 2013DiBattista et al, , 2015Terraneo et al, 2014;Huang et al, 2014;Arrigoni et al, 2015;van der Meij et al, 2015;Spaet and Berumen, 2015).…”

Phylogeny of deepwater snappers (Genus Etelis) reveals a cryptic species pair in the Indo-Pacific and Pleistocene invasion of the Atlantic

“…The biogeographic provinces peripheral to the Western Pacific, including Hawai'i and the Red Sea, are now known to be evolutionary incubators that can export species (Eble et al, 2011;DiBattista et al, 2013;Fernandez-Silva et al, 2015). In the center of this range, an intermittent barrier between the Indian and Pacific Oceans can also serve as a starting point for speciation (Gaither and Rocha, 2013).…”