Cryptic Species of Pacific Skinks (Emoia): Further Support from Mitochondrial DNA Sequences Author(s): Emilio M. Bruna, Robert N. Fisher and Ted J. Case Source: Copeia, Vol. 1995, No. 4 (Dec. 21, 1995), pp. 981-983 Published by: American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists (ASIH) Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1447050 Accessed: 19-01-2018 18:13 UTC JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists (ASIH) is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Copeia This content downloaded from 128.227.206.97 on Fri, 19 Jan 2018 18:13:11 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms SHORTER CONTRIBUTIONS 981 13-213. In: Evolutionary tions. dynamicsOne use of these techniques of genetic is the iden- di- versity. G. S. Mani (ed.). tification Springer-Verlag, of sibling and cryptic species, Berlin. which PHILIPP, D. P., W. F. CHILDERS, often have broad AND overlap inG. diagnostic S. WHITT. char- 1979. Evolution of differential acters (e.g., Hutchinson patterns et al., 1990; of Hickson gene expression: a comparison of the temporal and spa- et al., 1992; Austin, 1995). A longstanding ex- tial patterns of isozyme locus expression in two ample of this is found in the scincid genus Emoia, closely related fish species (northern largemouth bass, Micropterus salmoides where the high salmoides, degree of morphological and simi-small- mouth bass, Micropterus larity dolomieui). between two sibling J. speciesExp. has Zool. led to al- 210: 473-488. most a century of confusion. Werner (1898) first SHAKLEE, J. B., F. W. ALLENDORF, D. C. MORIZOT, described Emoia impar from the Bismarck Ar- AND G. S. WHITT. 1990. Gene nomenclature for chipelago and distinguished it from Emoia cy- protein-coding loci in fish. Trans. Am. Fish. anura Soc. by two characters: the presence of mid- 119:2-15. dorsal scale fusion and absence of a parietal eye. STRITTHOLT, J. R., S. I. GUTTMAN, AND T. However, E. Wis- the distinction between the two spe- SING. 1988. Low levels of genetic variability of yel- cies was never widely accepted, and most lit- low perch (Percaflavescens) in Lake Erie and selected impoundments, p. 246-257. In: The biogeography erature this century has followed Burt and Burt of the island region of western Lake Erie. (1932) J. F.in not using the name E. impar. During Downhower (ed.). Ohio State Univ. Press, theColum- 1970s, T. P. Webster noted that there were bus. two distinct morphotypes in what was formally SWOFFORD, D. L., AND G. J. OLSEN. 1990. Phylogeny recognized as E. cyanura (notes in bottles of E. reconstruction, p. 411-501. In: Molecular system-cyanura at the United States National Museum atics. D. M. Hillis and C. Moritz (eds.). Sinauer of Natural As- History identifying specimens as E. sociates, Inc. Sunderland, MA. impar are initialed with TPWIII). Webster nev- - , AND R. B. SELANDER. 1981. BIOSYS-1: a er redescribed this taxon, and both morpho- FORTRAN program for the comprehensive anal- ysis of electrophoretic data in population geneticstypes continued to be referred to as E. cyanura. and systematics. J. Heredity 72:281-283. Ineich (1987) suggested that E. cyanura was ac- THORPE, J. E. 1977. Morphology, physiology, tually be- two cryptic but distinct species that were havior, and ecology of Perca fluviatilis L. sympatric and P. throughout their distribution, and he flavescens Mitchill. J. Fish. Res. Bd. Can. 34:1504-described one morphotype as Emoia pheonura. 1514. This description was synonymized by Brown THORPE, J. P. 1983. Enzyme variation, genetic dis- (1991), however, who believed that the evi- tance and evolutionary divergence in relation todence presented by Ineich was unconvincing levels of taxonomic separation, p. 131-152. In: Pro- and that Crombie and Steadman (1986) had tein polymorphism: adaptive and taxonomic signif- shown that these characters were unable to re- icance. G. S. Oxford and D. Rollinson (eds.). Aca- demic Press, New York. solve the species. After examining over 1200 museum specimens, Ineich and Zug (1991) re- J. ELLEN MARSDEN, Center for Aquatic Ecology, evaluated the description E. pheonura and con- Illinois Natural History Survey, Lake Michigan cluded that the two morphotypes represented Biological Station, 400 17th Street, Zion, Illinois the two distinct species, E. cyanura and E. impar. 60099; and TODD KASSLER AND DAVID PHIL- They also provided synonymies for each species IPP, Center for Aquatic Ecology, Illinois Natural and descriptions of five morphological charac- ters that can be used to differentiate between History Survey, 607 East Peabody Drive, Cham- paign, Illinois 61820. Submitted: 7 Feb. 1994. the two species: presence or absence of an Accepted: 19 Dec. 1994. Section editor: J. R. epiphesial eye, presence or absence of middor- Gold. sal scale fusion, underbelly color, tail hue, and differences in anterior loreal scale height and length. The presence of sympatric populations of both morphs with minimal overlap in these character states was interpreted as evidence that the morphotypes represented distinct, repro- Copeia, 1995(4), pp. 981-983 ductively isolated species. We used mitochon- ? 1995 by the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists drial DNA (mtDNA) sequences to determine the degree of sequence divergence within and CRYPTIC SPECIES OF PACIFIC SKINKS between the two morphs. Divergence between (EMOIA): FURTHER SUPPORT FROM MI- the morphs, along with similarity of sequence TOCHONDRIAL DNA SEQUENCES.-The within a morphotype, would support the hy- recent advances in molecular biology are ap-pothesis that the two morphotypes are separate plicable to a wide variety of taxonomic ques- species. This content downloaded from 128.227.206.97 on Fri, 19 Jan 2018 18:13:11 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 982 COPEIA, 1995, NO. 4 0.138 (121) Emoia caeruleocauda with the neighbor-joining method of Saitou and Efate, Vanuatu Nei (1987). The software package PHYLIP (Felsenstein, 1989) was used to conduct all anal- E. impar #1 yses. All sequences are available in Genbank, Rarotonga, Cook Islands and the accession numbers are included in Ma- 0.0843 (76) E. impar#2 terials Examined. Rarotonga, Cook Islands E. impar Results and discussion.-Sequence divergence Ovalau, Fiji between E. cyanura and E. impar was 17-19%, E. cyanura with E. caeruleocauda differing from E. cyanura 0.092 (74) 0.092 (74) Ovalau, E. cyanura Fiji #1 by 23% and from E. impar by 22-23%. Intra- Rarotonga, Cook Islands specific divergence between populations of E. E. cyanura #2 cyanura from Rarotonga and Ovalau was 0- Rarotonga, Cook Islands 0.002%. No sequence differences were found Fig. 1. Neighbor-joining tree depicting relation- between E. impar from Ovalau and Rarotonga ships among Emoia impar and E. cyanura from (Fig. the1). There were 150 base pair changes be- Cook Islands and Fiji and E. caeruleocauda from tween Va- E. impar and E. cyanura, 197 between E. nuatu. Branch numbers indicate the expected impar num- and E. caeruleocauda, and 195 between E. ber of nucleotide substitutions per site on that cyanurabranch; and E. caeruleocauda. absolute number of changes are in parentheses. The Ver- two species are clearly distinct, because tical branches represent zero distance. the amount of genetic divergence between E. cyanura and E. impar is comparable to that found between either species and E. caeruleocauda. Furthermore, the difference between individ- Methods and materials.-The amount of se- uals of the same species from different islands quence divergence between the two species was was less than 0.5%. This consistency corrobo- estimated by comparing 935 base pairs of ratesthe previously demonstrated differences in mitochondrially encoded cytochrome b (cyt morphology, b) strengthening the hypothesis that gene from individuals of both putative species the two represent distinct species. collected from two islands where the two morphs The level of divergence among species of occur in sympatry: Ovalau, Fiji; and Rarotonga, Emoia is similar to that found between other Cook Islands. Another similar species, Emoia closely related lizard species. Hedges et al. (1991) caeruleocauda, was also sequenced. DNA was used iso- cyt b sequences to reconstruct a phylogeny lated from liver using sodium chloride extrac- of xantusiid lizards. They found that the amount tion (Miller et al., 1988). The cyt b gene of was divergence between four closely related xan- amplified with the polymerase chain reaction tusiid species ranged from 13-19.6%. Thorpe (PCR) using published primers (L14724 et and al. (1994) found that three species of Gallotia H15560 from Palumbi et al., 1991; H15752 differed by 7.9-11.3%. from Richman and Price, 1992; L14817 and Emoia cyanura was previously believed to be H15175 from Kocher et al., 1989), as well asthe most widespread and abundant skink in the one developed in our laboratory (Radtkey et al., Pacific (Ineich and Zug, 1991; Zug, 1991). No 1995). Double-stranded DNA was amplified us- ecological studies have been conducted on E. ing the procedure of Innis et al. (1990); and cyanura since its revision, although Ineich (1987) from the products obtained, a small aliquot suggested that E. cyanura was found mainly in (5 X of the original 50-X reaction) was carried open habitats whereas E. impar preferred for- over to a second PCR reaction to which only ests. A posteriori analysis of voucher samples one primer was added. This produced a single and field notes (Zug, 1991) seems to support strand of DNA which was purified with micro- these conclusions, although at least one author centrifuge filtration units.