A divergent lineage among Octopus minor (Sasaki, 1920) populations in the Northwest Pacific supported by DNA barcoding

ABSTRACT

Octopus minor (Sasaki, 1920) is an important economic fishery resource in China. In order to explore the stock information and the phylogeographic status of O. minor, mitochondrial DNA cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI, 565 bp) and 16S rRNA (493 bp) genes were amplified from 11 different sampling locations. Genetic diversity evaluated by haplotypic and nucleotidic diversity implied high diversity in Lianjiang, and relatively low diversity in Rongcheng, which suggests that effective measures to protect the O. minor resource in this area are urgently required. Private haplotypes and remarkable higher pairwise Φ_ST in Yilan are responsible for the deep genetic divergence between Yilan and the 10 other populations. Haplotypes networks and two clusters’ topological structure also support the distinct subgroups (lineages A and lineages B), which apparently possess smaller genetic variation than mean interspecies distance. Taiwan island and its strait may act as a natural barrier that restricts the gene flow from the mainland. Deep genetic divergence between mainland and Taiwanese east coasts suggests different genetic stock, indicating that different management strategies are required.

SUBJECT EDITOR:

• Rachel Collin

KEYWORDS:

• Octopus minor
• DNA barcoding
• population genetics
• genetic stock
• geographical isolation

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge Dr Xiaolei Gao for her help with sample collection and lab work. The authors also thank Dr Gang Ni and Dr Shuang Li for their help with data analysis. The authors also want to send their gratitude to Dr Song He for his valuable advice for data analysis and data presentation, as well as his colleague, Dr Royale Hardenstine, for language correction. We also appreciate the constructive comments from Professor Chung-Cheng Lu. Special thanks are also given to Professor Mong-Fang Li from National Penghu University of Science and Technology for providing the specimens from Penghu.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 31672257]; National Marine Public Welfare Research Project of China [grant number 201305043].