Recent expansion of Northeast Atlantic and Mediterranean populations of Melicertus (Penaeus) kerathurus (Crustacea: Decapoda)

Abstract

We analysed the genetic diversity of Melicertus kerathurus (Penaeidae), a commercially valuable penaeid shrimp that is distributed in the Mediterranean Sea and eastern Atlantic Ocean. We examined the polymorphism of a 494 bp DNA segment of the mitochondrial COI region in 173 individuals, sampled in nine Mediterranean and two Atlantic samples, covering the whole range of the species from the tropical waters of the Gulf of Guinea to the eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea. The mean nucleotide and haplotype diversities were p = 0.00275 and h = 0.718, respectively, for the global data set, with the highest values occurring in the African samples and the lowest in the Adriatic Sea. A clear sample differentiation was found (F st = 0.194), but this did not reflect a geographical pattern and there were only faint traces of an Atlantic-Mediterranean subdivision. Mismatch analysis and a high significant negative value of Tajima's D suggested that M. kerathurus is not at mutation drift-equilibrium, but underwent a recent expansion after a period of low effective sample size. A postglacial recolonisation of the Mediterranean from an Atlantic refuge could be hypothesised based on these data.

Unique COI haplotypes in Hediste diversicolor populations in lagoons adjoining the Ionian Sea

“…The population of H. diversicolor in the Amvrakikos Gulf is not the only case found to be genetically distant. Similar results have been reported from microsattelite and COI data of the crustacean Melicertus kerathurus (Pellerito et al 2009, Arculeo et al 2010. According to the authors, the COI haplotypes from Amvrakikos were not common with any other haplotype obtained during the analysis, suggesting that the population had been isolated for a long time (Pellerito et al 2009).…”

“…Isolation between the Ionian and Adriatic Seas has been ascribed to the current circulation in the area combined with differences in salinity, temperature and depth (Ragio nieri & Schubart 2013). Previous studies on H. diversicolor (Hateley et al 1989, Abbiati & Maltagliati 1996, Bilton et al 2002, but also on other species such as M. kera thurus, A. fasciatus (Triantafyllidis et al 2007, Pellerito et al 2009), have attributed the genetic differentiation to both natural and anthropogenic environmental disturbance (i.e. heavy metals, salinity ranges).…”

Intra- and Inter-specific Variation of Four Acetes Species (Crustacea: Decapoda: Sergestidae) Sampled along the West Coast of Peninsular Malaysia

“…The L-shaped mismatch distribution has been reported in other shrimp species indicating population expansion from a smaller initial population and recent bottleneck events (Frankham et al 2002;Li et al 2009;Pellerito et al 2009;Rogers & Harpending 1992;Roldan et al 2009). As many as 10 major Pleistocene sea-level fluctuation events, during which the Sunda Shelf (including the Straits of Malacca) was exposed had occurred with the latest being the last-glacial maximum, around 18000-20000 years ago during which the sea level dropped to about 120 m below the present level in Southeast Asia (Hanebuth et al 2000;Pillans et al 1998).…”

“…The high haplotype diversity and low nucleotide diversity combination usually suggests a population that had undergone population bottlenecks followed by rapid population growth and accumulation of mutations (Avise et al 1984;Grant & Bowen 1998), which have also been noted in other marine species (Chen et al 2004;Daemen et al 2001;Kong et al 2010;Liu et al 2008;Maggio et al 2009;Pellerito et al 2009;Stockley et al 2005).…”

“…Sea and eastern Atlantic Ocean (Pellerito et al 2009), Western Mediterranean red shrimp Aristeus antennatus (Roldán et al 2009) and Indo-West Pacific portunid crabs (Lai et al 2010).…”