Phylogenetic analysis of the Black Stork Ciconia nigra (Ciconiiformes: Ciconiidae) based on complete mitochondrial genome

Abstract

The Black Stork, Ciconia nigra belongs to family Ciconiidae, which is evaluated as Least Concern by IUCN. In this study, the complete mitochondrial genome of C. nigra was first sequenced and characterized, which was 17,795 bp in length. The mt-genome has tandem repeats of 80 bp and 78 bp repeat units, and AAACAAC and AAACAAACAAC tandem repeats in D-loop region. It is notable that a single extra base “C” at position 174 was inserted in gene ND3. Bayesian inference, maximum likelihood methods were used to construct phylogenetic trees based on 12 heavy-strand protein-coding genes. Phylogenetic analyses showed that Ardeidae diverged earlier than Ciconiidae, Cathartida and Threskiornithidae, and Ciconiidae had closest relationship to Cathartida. C. nigra diverged first among three Ciconia birds.

• Ciconia nigra
• complete mitochondrial genome
• phylogeny

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Guo Cai at Sichuan University for specimen collection and identification.

Declaration of interest

This research was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 31172118). The study had no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the article.