Iranian Journal of Fisheries Sciences 19(6) 3034-3049 2020 DOI: 10.22092/ijfs.2020.122932 Research Article Morphological identification and phylogenetic analysis of Asteroidea in the northern coast of the Persian Gulf Adeli B.1; Ghavam Mostafavi P.1*; Fatemi M.R.1 Received: December 2019 Accepted: August 2020 Abstract Asteroidae, or starfish, is one of the classes of phylum Echinodermata that its phylogenetic relationships have not been studied in the Persian Gulf so far. In this research, the morphological identification, molecular analysis and phylogeny of 40 asteroid samples were studied from the northern islands of the Persian Gulf. For this purpose, starfish samples were identified using morphological characteristics. The molecular identification was performed based on two fragments of mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) and mt 16S rRNA. The phylogenetic relationships of asteroids were analyzed using maximum likelihood, maximum parsimony and Bayesian methods. Eleven species of starfishes belonging to 6 genera as well as 5 families have been identified including Luidia hardwicki, Astropecten hemprichi, Astropecten indicus, Astropecten polyacanthus phragmorus, Astropecten polyacanthus polyacanthus, of Culcita novaeguineae, Pentaceraster mammillatus, Linckia laevigata, Linckia multifora, Aquilonastra iranica and Aquilonastra watersi. Since the species of Linckia laevigata (orange-green morph) and a specimen of Astropecten polyacanthus Downloaded from jifro.ir at 20:25 +0330 on Sunday September 26th 2021 polyacanthus have been identified based on molecular analysis, this technique can be a useful tool in asteroids along with morphological studies. The obtained interspecies distances in genera Luidia and Astropecten suggest cryptic speciation might have occurred in these genera. The results of Asteroidae classifications at the genus and family levels indicated phylogenetic tree of mt 16S rRNA gene based on Bayesian method is consistent with previous morphological taxonomic and phylogenetic analyses. Keywords: mt 16S rRNA, Cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI), Asteroidae, Persian Gulf 1- Department of Marine Sciences, Faculty of Natural Resources and Environment, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran *Corresponding author's email: [email protected] 3035 Adeli et al., Morphological identification and phylogenetic analysis of Asteroidea in ... Introduction competition, reproduction (Menge, Asteroidea (starfish or sea stars) is one 1975; Meng et al., 1999) and of the most diverse classes of phylum community structure (Paine, 1969, Echinodermata (Knott and Wray, 2000; 1974). Asteroids were also study Matsubara et al., 2004) comprising subjects in marine pollution, about 1900 extant species, 36 families toxicological global warming (Danis et and approximately 370 extant genera al., 2003; Georgiades et al., 2006) and (Mah and Blake, 2012). This class ocean acidification (McClintock et al., includes three superorders of 2011; Gooding et al., 2009). Valvatacea, Forcipulatacea and The species of asteroids Spinulosacea. Valvataceans distributed characterizes by color pattern, the worldwide, especially in the tropical number and length of arms, the number Indo-Pacific region. This superorder has of madreporites, papulae, paxillae (in some ecologically important families of paxillosidans), actinal plates, form of asteroids including Astropectinidae and supero and Infero marginal plates and Luidiidae (in order Paxillosida) as well spines, adambulacral and furrow spines as Oreasteridae, Ophidiasteridae and (Clark and Row, 1971). Although Asterinidae (in order Valvatida) (Mah species of sea stars typically identify by and Foltz, 2011). morphological characteristics, the The family Asterinidae cling to hard phenotypic diversity is so high in some substrates with flat ventral surface species of Asteroidea and taxonomic (Waters et al., 2004a) appearing to be boundaries are difficult to be detritivores or omnivores. Asterinids determined (William, 2000; Zulliger are studied in developmental and larval and Lessios, 2010 and Ning et al., biology (Mah and Blake, 2012). 2013). Some morphological Downloaded from jifro.ir at 20:25 +0330 on Sunday September 26th 2021 Oreasteridae and Ophidiasteridae are characteristics are similar in species of significant members of the ecological the same genus, such as the number of communities of coral reefs (Williams, madreporites in species of Linckia that 2000; Mah and Foltz, 2011). As these makes difficult to identify species are taken for tourist and morphologically. The genus Linckia aquarium/pet industries and become a distinguishes by cylindrical arms, small subject of concern by conservation oral disc, granules and popular pores on biologists (Mah and Foltz, 2011). The aboral surface (William, 2000). Clark Astropectinidae and Luidiidae live in and Row (1971) suggested that body sandy or muddy substrate where they color is a useful tool for identification feed on molluscs and other of Linckia species, but there are invertebrates (Zulliger and Lessios, considerable diversities in color of 2010; Ning et al., 2013). some species. Therefore, their Asteroids are important in ecological descriptions cannot help us to identify studies addressing the role of the species with a variety of phenotype. Iranian Journal of Fisheries Sciences 19(6) 2020 3036 Echinoderm larvae are pelagic and performed based on molecular identified morphologically to family identification concerning to identify the level (Ward et al., 2008). On the other species boundary of the starfishes of hand, having a long planktonic larval this region, molecular and phylogenetic stage resulted in low species diversity analyses of this class can provide more in echinoderms. However, the genus accurate information related to Astropecten has approximately 150 identifications of Asteroidea in the described species (Zulliger and Lessios, northern parts of the Persian Gulf. 2010). Although several taxonomic characters such as paxillae and the Materials and methods superomarginal plates with the number Sampling and DNA extraction and shape of the superomarginal spines Forty four specimens from six genera of contribute for the identification of Asteroids were collected between May species, but there are high phenotypic 2017 and September 2018 at 7 locations variability in species of Astropecten from the northern islands of the Persian (Gondim, et al., 2014). Gulf by scuba diving in the subtidal The Asteroids of the Persian Gulf zones (Fig. 1). The samples were have been studied morphologically in transferred to the laboratory and the previous studies (Mortensen and significant morphological Heding, 1940; Clark and Row, 1971; characteristics were photographed using Price, 1981, 1982, 1983; Price and a stereomicroscope (Leica Ez40) and Rezai, 1996 and Pourvali, 2015). Since identified based on described no comprehensive study has been morphological features by Clark and Row (1971). Downloaded from jifro.ir at 20:25 +0330 on Sunday September 26th 2021 Figure 1: The locations of the sampling stations 3037 Adeli et al., Morphological identification and phylogenetic analysis of Asteroidea in ... 61 genomic DNA was extracted from amplification are listed in Table 1. PCR tube foot or arm tip tissue using a 5% amplification was performed under the Chelex solution (Walsh et al., 1991) or following thermal profile: an initial a CTAB-proteinase K extraction buffer denaturation step at 94°C for 5 min, 30 (Baker, 1999). amplification cycles (94°C for 30 s, 57°C (COI fragment) and 49°C (16S PCR amplification and sequencing fragment) for 60 s, 72°C for 30 s) and a The fragments of the two regions of final extension step at 72°C for 5 min. mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) were The amplicons were visualized by 1.5% amplified: 1300 bp of the 16S agarose gel electrophoresis. The PCR ribosomal RNA (16S) and specific products were sent to Bioneer Company primers of different genera for the in South Korea and sequenced with an cytochrome oxidase sub region I (COI). ABI- 3730XL analyzer. The primers which were used for DNA Table 1: PCR and the sequencing primers used for the two mitochondrial DNA regions. Region Primer Sequence (5′-3′) Reference COI LCOІ1490 (F) GGTCAACAAATCATAAAGATATTG Folmer et al., 1994 HCOІ2198 (R) TAAACTTCAGGGTGACCAAAAAATCA Folmer et al., 1994 ECOIa(F) ACCATGCAACTAAGACGATGA Knott et al., 2000 ECOIb(R) GGTAGTCTGAGTATCGTCGAG Knott et al., 2000 cHCO(F) TGATTTTTGGTCACCCTGAAGTTT Folmer et al., 1994 EF(F) ATAATGATAGGAGGRTTTGG Arndt et al., 1996 ER(R) GCTCGTGTRTCTACRTCCAT Arndt et al., 1996 16S AST16SL2 (F) CGTAGGATTTTAATGGTCGAACAGA Waters et al., 2004a AST16SR2 (R) TGTGAAGGAAAGTTGAAATAATGTG Waters et al. 2004b * The primers used for amplification of Astropecten species. Downloaded from jifro.ir at 20:25 +0330 on Sunday September 26th 2021 Molecular identification and (ML), maximum parsimony (MP), and phylogenetic analysis Bayesian inference (BI) methods. The resulting sequences were blasted in MP analysis was conducted using the NCBI database. The nucleotide PAUP, Ver. 4.0b10 (Swofford, 2002) sequences were deposited in GenBank by heuristic search for 100 random and their accession numbers were addition replicates using TBR branch received. The 16S rRNA and COI swapping and keeping 100 trees per sequences were aligned by CLUSTAL replicate. We assessed clade support in W software (Thompson et al., 1994). MP analyses performing 1,000 Kimura 2-parameter genetic distances bootstrap resampling replicates. In for COΙ sequences