Abstract: Event Abstract Back to Event Phoxinus morella a cryptic species? Udo Rothe1, Juliane D. Weiß1*, Matthias Geiger2, Nancy Martinez1 and Jobst Pfaender1* 1 Naturkundemuseum Potsdam, Germany 2 Zoological Research Museum Alexander Koenig (LG), Germany The genus Phoxinus (Cypriniformes: Leuciscidae), commonly known as Eurasian minnow, has its distribution range throughout Europe and North Asia. At present, the genus includes at least 15 species. Demonstrating interspecific differentiation within Phoxinus using traditional taxonomic characters has proven to be challenging (Palandačić et al. 2017). The main reasons are small interspecific morphological differentiation (Palandačić et al. 2017), a high phenotypic plasticity (Ramler et al. 2017) and the lack of holotype material for some of the species. Due to the lack of morphological differentiation of putative species, several have been synonymized in the past, e.g. P. lumaireul and P. morella (Kottelat 1997, 2007) with P. phoxinus. However, a comprehensive revision of the genus Phoxinus based on analyses of mitochondrial DNA indicated a high (cryptic) diversity and identified genetic differentiation between species, which had been synonymized according to morphological characters (Palandačić et al. 2017). The taxonomic status of P. morella (Leske 1774), described from the Bode Creek near Rübeland (Central Germany, Elbe drainage system), which has been synonymized with P. phoxinus by Kottelat (1997), remained unclear due to a lack of samples from the type locality and the potential distribution range in northern parts of Germany (Palandačić et al. 2017). In the present study, we used morphological characters and molecular data (cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (COI)) to test for the hypothesis, that P. morella is a valid species and not a synonym of P. phoxinus. In total, 630 specimens from 29 sampling locations in northern Germany, including the type locality of P. morella and neotype locality of P. phoxinus have been incorporated in the phylogenetic analysis. Additionally, 90 Sequences available from NCBI GenBank were included in the dataset to representatively cover all adjacent mitochondrial lineages presented in the revision of Palandačić et al. (2017). For assessing the genetic diversity and mitochondrial lineages, a haplotype network was constructed, applying median joining algorithm (Bandelt, Forster & Röhl 1999) and results were visualized using the software PopArt (Leigh & Bryant 2015). Traditional taxonomic characters, lateral line scales and fin rays have been counted for a subsample of 210 specimens, including individuals from the P. morella type location and compared with the literature data available for P. phoxinus (Palandačić et al. 2017). The morphological dataset revealed no significant differences between the analyzed individuals from the northern part of Germany and P. phoxinus, but they formed one distinct cluster in the haplotype network of the phylogenetic analyses (Fig. 1). This cluster showed significant genetic differentiation from all other lineages by a large number of nucleotide substitutions (Fig. 1). In contrast, variation is present also within the clade of the specimens from northern Germany, but is significantly lower than between clade variation. These findings of distinct mitochondrial lineage suggest, that the population of Phoxinus in the northern part of Germany belongs to the currently synonymized species P. morella (Leske 1774). Our results go in line with the results of the former revision on the phylogenetic relationship of Phoxinus species in Europe (Palandačić et al. 2017) and complement our knowledge about the (cryptic) diversity of Phoxinus in northern Europe. Figure Legend: Haplotype network was constructed with the software PopArt for 720 Phoxinus specimens with a median joining algorithm, based on COI. Dashes indicate number of nucleotide substitutions. Figure 1 Acknowledgements We thank G. Füllner (Sächsisches Landesamt für Umwelt, Landwirtschaft und Geologie), O. Wüstemann (Nationalparkverwaltung Harz), U. Thiel (Landesanglerverband Brandenburg) and the Landesamt für Landwirtschaft, Lebensmittelsicherheit und Fischerei Mecklenburg-Vorpommern for permits and logistical support. We are grateful to M. Purps (Landessportfischerverband Schleswig-Holstein e.V.) for providing samples from Schleswig-Holstein. Genetic analyses have been funded by the LELF Brandenburg. References Bandelt, H., Forster, P., Röhl, A. (1999). Median-joining networks for inferring intraspecific phylogenies. Mol Biol Evol 16(1):37–48. Leigh, J.W., Bryant, D. (2015). PopART: Full-feature software for haplotype network construction. Methods Ecol Evol 6(9):1110–1116. Leske, N. G. (1774) Ichthyologiae Lipsiensis specimen. Lipsiae (S. L. Crusius). i-iv + 1-82. Kottelat, M. (1997). European freshwater fishes. Biologia (Bratislava) v. 52 (suppl. 5): 1-271. Kottelat, M. (2007). Three new species of Phoxinus from Greece and southern France (Teleostei: Cyprinidae). Ichthyol Explor Fres, 18(2), 145. Palandačić, A., Naseka, A., Ramler, D., & Ahnelt, H. (2017). Contrasting morphology with molecular data: an approach to revision of species complexes based on the example of European Phoxinus (Cyprinidae). BMC evolutionary biology, 17(1), 184. Ramler, D., Palandačić, A., Delmastro, G. B., Wanzenböck, J., & Ahnelt, H. (2017). Morphological divergence of lake and stream Phoxinus of Northern Italy and the Danube basin based on geometric morphometric analysis. Ecol Evol, 7(2), 572-584. Keywords: Phoxinus (Cyprinidae), Phoxinus morella, COI, cryptic species, molecular taxonomy Conference: XVI European Congress of Ichthyology, Lausanne, Switzerland, 2 Sep - 6 Sep, 2019. Presentation Type: Poster Topic: TAXONOMY, PHYLOGENY AND ZOOGEOGRAPHY Citation: Rothe U, Weiß JD, Geiger M, Martinez N and Pfaender J (2019). Phoxinus morella a cryptic species?. Front. Mar. Sci. Conference Abstract: XVI European Congress of Ichthyology. doi: 10.3389/conf.fmars.2019.07.00127 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 24 May 2019; Published Online: 14 Aug 2019. * Correspondence: Mx. Juliane D Weiß, Naturkundemuseum Potsdam, Potsdam, Brandenburg, Germany, [email protected] Dr. Jobst Pfaender, Naturkundemuseum Potsdam, Potsdam, Brandenburg, Germany, [email protected] Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. 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