Genetic structure of Heliofungia actiniformis (Scleractinia: Fungiidae) populations in the Indo-Malay Archipelago: implications for live coral trade management efforts

Abstract

The fungiid Heliofungia actiniformis is one of the most popular scleractinian coral species in the growing live aquarium trade, with the majority of specimens originating in Indonesia. Details on population connectivity may potentially provide important information with regards to harvest management efforts. Genetic structure was examined, using ribosomal ITS1, 5.8S and partial ITS2 sequences on a small scale among populations in the Spermonde Archipelago, South Sulawesi (up to 65 km distance, U st = 0.09), and on a large scale throughout the Indo-Malay Archipelago (up to 2,900 km distance, U st = 0.26). Significant genetic structuring was found at both scales. Within the Spermonde Archipelago isolation by distance as well as local oceanographic features shaped patterns of genetic connectivity. On the large scale, the data revealed genetically distinct populations in Tomini Bay, New Guinea and the Thousand Islands near Jakarta, and a lack of genetic differentiation among populations lying close to or directly in the path of the Indonesian throughflow: from the central Visayas to the Flores Sea (U ct = 0.32). Whilst the influence of both historical and present day processes on genetic structuring of H. actiniformis populations was revealed, large scale results further emphasised the importance of oceanographic dynamics on larval dispersal patterns in this species. Potential for larval input from surrounding populations, and the increased vulnerability of upstream as well as isolated populations should be taken into consideration when setting future harvest quotas.

The New Systematics of Scleractinia: Integrating Molecular and Morphological Evidence

“…Colours differentiate adjacent families and are not unique for any taxa, except for genera assigned incertae sedis that are shown in black statistically using SeqPHASE (Flot 2010). Furthermore, direct sequencing of ITS has been carried out following PCR with primers demonstrating high fidelity for a single copy (Takabayashi et al 1998a(Takabayashi et al , b, 2003Lam and Morton 2003;Benzoni et al 2007Benzoni et al , 2010Benzoni et al , 2011Benzoni et al , 2012aBenzoni et al , b, 2014Mangubhai et al 2007;Stefani et al 2008b;Knittweis et al 2009;Huang et al 2011;Benzoni and Stefani 2012). Nevertheless, since the intra-individual variability of these nuclear markers is not fully understood (Chen et al 2004;Vollmer and Palumbi 2004), caution should be exercised even when using these primer sets.…”

Genetic population structures of the blue starfish Linckia laevigata and its gastropod ectoparasite Thyca crystallina

“…Additionally, a growing number of population genetic studies in the Indo-Malay Archipelago show a complex pattern of divergent lineages and restricted gene flow, e.g. in a clownfish , giant clams (Kochzius & Nuryanto 2008, Nuryanto & Kochzius 2009), and a mushroom coral (Knittweis et al 2009). …”

Reduced Genetic Diversity in the Clown Anemonefish Amphiprion ocellaris in Exploited Reefs of Spermonde Archipelago, Indonesia

“…In a study on the anemonefish species A. clarkii significant F ST -values (=0.028) were found between sites on a similarly small scale in the Philippines (Pinsky and Palumbi, 2014). A strong genetic population structure was also found at a larger scale in the same species as well as in other coral reef organisms in this region (Kochzius and Nuryanto, 2008;Timm and Kochzius, 2008;Knittweis et al, 2009;Nuryanto and Kochzius, 2009;Timm et al, 2012;Dohna et al, 2015;Hui et al, 2016Hui et al, , 2017. In addition, the previous study on these two island populations revealed high self-recruitment in A. ocellaris of about 40-60% (Madduppa et al, 2014b), which explains the genetic differentiation.…”