Finding of a putative Lake Baikal endemic, Lindavia minuta, in distant lakes near the Arctic pole in Yakutia (Russia)

Abstract

In the northern lakes of Yakutia, Vorota and Labynkyr, which are 2100 kilometres northeast of Lake Baikal, we found a putative Lake Baikal endemic, Lindavia minuta. Morphological analysis and non-metric multidimensional scaling showed that L. minuta populations from Yakutian and Transbaikalian lakes belong to the same (morpho) species. The possible dispersal history is discussed. The most probable hypothesis is that L. minuta was present in the Baikal basin during several Pleistocene glaciation cycles, and since Lake Baikal was previously connected to the River Lena, it is possible that there was a stable population of this species in the river, and that the river carried some cells to other suitable habitats. During glaciated periods, L. minuta could also have survived for longer periods in several ice dam lakes and possibly dispersed further north-east to the lakes in Yakutia.

Keywords:

• Cyclotella minuta
• Lindavia minuta
• diatoms
• Labynkyr
• Vorota
• Yakutia
• Baikal
• biogeography
• glaciation
• disjunct distributions

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by projects No. 0376-2019-0003 (АААА-А17- 117020110056-0) of the Institute for Biological Problems of Cryolithozone SB RAS and No. 0345-2019-0001 of the Limnological Institute of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences SB RAS at the in the Electron Microscopy Center of Collective Instrumental Center ‘Ultra microanalysis’. The authors express their gratitude to the enthusiasts of Cold Pole exploration, a member of the Russian Geographical Society A. A. Dolzhenkov and the Chairman of the Oymyakon chapter of the Russian Geographical Society in the Sakha republic I. E. Zhullyarov for their help during the expeditions; to divers D.A. Shiller (RGS of the Tatarstan Republic, Kazan) and A.S. Gubin for taking the sediment samples. We would like to thank Dr. Teofil Nakov and two anonymous reviewers for commenting on, and improving the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).