Four new species of coral gobies (Teleostei: Gobiidae: Gobiodon), with comments on their relationships within the genus

Abstract

Four new species of the coral-associated gobiid genus Gobiodon were discovered in the Red Sea. Although several of these species are common not only in the Red Sea but also in the Indian and western Pacific Ocean, they have not been described before. Detailed descriptions of the four species are based on morphological and molecular genetic (mitochondrial 12s and 16s rRNA) investigations. The new species, like most species of the genus, lack scales and have species-specific life colouration. Gobiodon bilineatus sp. nov. is the closest relative to G. quinquestrigatus (Valenciennes) and of G. sp. D (Munday et al.), and has five distinct, blue lines on the head as juveniles and subadults, which disappear in adults, and which are often uniformly orange-red with two distinct, vertical blue lines through each eye. Gobiodon irregularis sp. nov. has been confused with the former new species in the past, and is closely related to G. oculolineatus Wu, but is unmistakable in live colouration. Juveniles are characterised by a transparent body, red bars on the head with bluish to greyish interspaces, and irregular red lines and dots on the nape and dorsally on the body. Adults are usually uniformly brown or green-brown, with only remnants of the bars through the eye and below the orbit. Gobiodon ater sp. nov. is a small, entirely black species and can be easily confused with other black species, although it is genetically clearly distinct from G. ceramensis Bleeker and its black relatives. Gobiodon fuscoruber sp. nov. is likely to be the closest relative of G. ater sp. nov., but is uniformly reddish-brown or brown, has bright median fin margins (at least in the Red Sea), and grows considerably larger than G. ater. It has been genetically determined that G. fuscoruber sp. nov. is identical with an Indian Ocean/western Pacific species that has been called G. unicolor Castelnau by several authors. However, examination of the holotype of G. unicolor, including the original description, revealed that the type species and original description are clearly different from the species frequently called G. unicolor. The holotype resembles G. histrio (Valenciennes) and the name G. unicolor must therefore be considered a junior synonym of G. histrio. As a consequence, a new name for this species is provided.

The Complete Mitochondrial Genome of Platysternon megacephalum peguense and Molecular Phylogenetic Analysis

“…peguense is more highly differentiated than the other two subspecies. Although this has previously been suggested, the complete 13 PCGs comparison can obtain more genetic information than single gene fragments, and thus reduces the effects of specific mitochondrial gene fragments [56]. The analysis presented, in combination with the species of 13 PCGs, showed that the genetic distances between P .…”

A review of contemporary patterns of endemism for shallow water reef fauna in the Red Sea

“…Molecular tools are proving useful for the identification of cryptic lineages in endemism hotspots such as Hawai'i (Randall et al ., ), the Marquesas Islands (Szabo et al ., ) and the Red Sea (Randall & DiBattista, ). In the Red Sea, only 10% of the new species descriptions listed in Table were corroborated using molecular data, but this includes three new species of fish (DiBattista et al ., ; Herler et al ., ; Koeda et al ., ) and a coral (Terraneo et al ., ). As molecular tools are applied more broadly, endemism in the region will continue to rise.…”

Complete mitogenomes of four Trichiurus species: A taxonomic review of the T. lepturus species complex

“…Among all molecular markers, the mtDNA COI and cyt b genes have been the most frequently used (Yang et al 2016;Han et al 2019;Hsu et al 2020;Ju et al 2021). In addition, some studies have used mtDNA rRNA (12S and 16S) sequences to resolve phylogenetic relationships and taxonomy (Byrne et al 2010;Herler et al 2013;Zheng et al 2016). However, the results of pairwise p-distances based on 16S rRNA and cyt b genes differed in this study (Table 6).…”