“…The availability of mtDNA data has provided new perspectives on taxonomically debatable taxa and confusing questions of phylogeny (Groves and Shields, 1996). Among many mitochondrial genes, the mitochondrial cytochrome b gene has been widely used to study genetic variation (McVeigh and Davidson, 1991), phylogenetic relationships (Cavender and Coburn, 1992;Groves and Shields, 1996;Gilles et al, 1998;Perdices et al, 2004;Xiao et al, 2001), biogeographical patterns (Durand et al, 2002;Gilles et al, 2001;Xiao et al, 2001;Zardoya and Doadrio, 1999), and taxonomy (Burridge, 1999;Xiao et al, 2001) in many fishes and vertebrates. The rate of evolution of the cytochrome b gene (documented in Irwin et al, 1991) is appropriate for investigating events that have occurred within the last 20 million years, such as the evolution of the Cyprinidae.…”