Diversity and DNA barcoding of marine algae around two Korean stations in the Arctic and the Antarctic

Abstract

The aim of the current investigation was to survey on diversity and biogeography of marine algae around Dasan Station in Svalbard (Spitsbergen), the Arctic, and King Sejong Station in King George Island, the Antarctic based on morphology and DNA barcoding. The diversity and biogeography of representative marine algae in the Arctic, the Antarctic and their neighbouring regions including the North Atlantic, southern Chile and Tasmania were investigated. Three bangialean, six corallinalean, nine desmarestialean, and eight laminarialean entities were discriminated on the basis of their morphological characteristics, and cox1 sequences were extracted from these entities for molecular comparisons. Of the 127 aligned sequences for representative brown desmarestialean and laminarialean algae, there were 127 individuals within 52 species (from 1 to 12 isolates depending on the species) for which within species variation was between 0 and 1 (to 5) bp out of the 658 positions or 0-0.77% divergence. Between species comparisons within genera generally ranged between 20 and 80 changes or 3.1 and 12.3% divergence, respectively, which were somewhat less than those (4.5 and 13.6%) observed in red bangialean and corallinalean algae. There was thus a clear distinction in divergence within versus between species observable with cox1 for representative brown and red algae studied ？

clearly a necessary attribute for a marker system to be considered useful for the task of species assignment.