DNA barcoding and phylogenetics of Ramicrusta and Incendia gen. nov., two early diverging lineages of the Peyssonneliaceae (Rhodophyta)

Abstract

Dixon K.R. and Saunders G.W. 2013. DNA barcoding and phylogenetics of Ramicrusta and Incendia gen. nov., two early diverging lineages of the Peyssonneliaceae (Rhodophyta). Phycologia 52: 82–108. DOI: 10.2216/12–62.1

Secondary pit-connections were previously known from only two species in a single genus of the Peyssonneliaceae, Ramicrusta nanhaiensis and Ramicrusta textilis. However, during ongoing surveys for representative Peyssonneliaceae in Australia and Vanuatu, we uncovered a diversity of peyssonnelioid collections that displayed this anatomical feature. We combined DNA barcoding, using the COI-5P mitochondrial marker to recognize genetic species groups and assign replicate samples to those same groups, with traditional anatomical observations to characterize 11 distinct species with secondary pit-connections. A diverse sampling of the genetic groups was included in molecular phylogenetic analyses using rbcL, EF2 and COI-5P individually and in various combinations to resolve the evolutionary affinities of these species among other Peyssonneliaceae. Our results indicated that peyssonnelioid species with secondary pit-connections resolved in two distinct lineages, necessitating description of Incendia gen. nov. for six new species from Vanuatu – Incendia crenata sp. nov., Incendia regularis sp. nov., Incendia cryptotricha sp. nov., Incendia glabra sp. nov., Incendia basilii sp. nov. and Incendia undulata sp. nov. We additionally expand Ramicrusta, recognizing five species from Vanuatu, Ramicrusta textilis, Ramicrusta lateralis sp. nov., Ramicrusta appressa sp. nov., Ramicrusta trichaurea sp. nov. and Ramicrusta aranea sp. nov., one from southern Australia, Ramicrusta australica sp. nov. and one from New Guinea, Ramicrusta calcea comb. nov.

Key Words::

• Cytochrome c oxidase I
• DNA Barcoding
• Incendia
• Peyssonneliaceae
• Phylogenetics
• Ramicrusta
• Rhodophyta
• Secondary pit-connections
• Vanuatu

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors would like to thank L. Le Gall, D. McDevit, T. Moore and A. Johnson for generating a portion of the sequence data; C. Maggs, J. Huisman and G. Furnari for providing specimens and Gerard Thijsse and the National Herbarium of the Netherlands for access to loaned material. We also thank two other reviewers for their constructive criticism of this manuscript. This research was supported by funding to the Canadian Barcode of Life Network from Genome Canada through the Ontario Genomics Institute, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and other sponsors listed at http://www.BOLNET.ca. Additional support was provided by the Canada Research Chair Program and Australian Biological Resources Study, as well as infrastructure support from the Canada Foundation for Innovation and New Brunswick Innovation Foundation.

SUPPLEMENTARY DATA

Supplementary data associated with this article can be found online at http://dx.doi.org/10.2216/12-62.1.s1.