title: Caribbean placozoan phylogeography.
abstract: We here address placozoan distribution and phylogeography in five locations in the Caribbean Sea. We performed a coarse-resolution presence/absence survey of placozoans in Belize, Bermuda, Grenada, Jamaica, and Panama and a fine-resolution study of the distribution of placozoans in Twin Cays, Belize. Placozoans were recovered in every country sampled. Animals were sequenced at the mitochondrial 16S rDNA locus, and our analysis identified four of the five previously identified clades present in the Caribbean. In addition, we discovered two new haplotypes within one of these clades, and we found sympatric clades in Belize, Bermuda, Jamaica, and Panama. These studies provide further molecular evidence for species diversity within the Phylum Placozoa.
authors.affiliation: Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University, 165 Prospect Street, OML, New Haven, Connecticut 06511, USA. asignorovitch@mcb.harvard.edu
authors.forename: Ana Y
authors.initials: AY
authors.lastname: Signorovitch
authors.forename: Stephen L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Dellaporta
authors.forename: Leo W
authors.initials: LW
authors.lastname: Buss
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D001531:Belize; D017691:Caribbean Region; D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D007448:Invertebrates / Q000235:genetics*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S / Q000737:chemistry / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial; D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S