Diversity, DNA barcoding and phylogeny of representative brown and red algae around two Korean stations in the Antarctic and the Arctic

Abstract

The aim of the current investigation was to survey on diversity, phylogeny 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 morphological and molecular data. The diversity, phylogeny and biogeography of representative brown and red algae in the Arctic, the Antarctic and their neighbouring regions including the North Atlantic, southern Chile, Tasmania and South Africa were investigated. Three bangialean, six ceramialean, 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 135 aligned sequences for representative brown algae worldwide, there were 135 individuals within 54 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 0-0.8% divergence. Between species comparisons within genera generally ranged between 20 and 80 changes or 3.0 and 12.2% divergence, respectively, which were somewhat less than those (4.5 and 13.6%) observed in 299 taxa of red 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. Phylogeny and biogeography of representative brown and red algae around two Korean polar stations will be also discussed.