Reproduction in the North Atlantic oceanic ichthyofauna and the relationship between fecundity and species' sizes

Synopsis The pelagic (589 spp.) and demersal (505 spp.) oceanic ichthyofaunas of the North Atlantic Basin have very different compositions at ordinal and family level. Yet the pattern of relationships between species' maximum size and maximum fecundity from data available (10% of the pelagic, 19% of the demersal species) was similar. A positive relationship between fecundity and weight was confirmed among most teleosts, but was not followed by the elasmobranchs represented. Species' reproductive styles are reviewed in ordinal groupings within a framework of the overall body size/fecundity distribution. Species size (maximum weight) spectra were synthesized for both pelagic and demersal assemblages to assess the allocation of potential reproductive effort throughout the North Atlantic oceanic ichthyofauna. The only available examples of species size spectra and biomass spectra from the pelagic and demersal ichthyofauna in this ocean basin imply geographic and bathymetric variation in overall reproductive effort among fishes whose fecundity is size dependent. Further implications concerning reproductive effort are discussed in the light of food availability.     

Phylogeny ofRubiaceae-Rubieae inferred from the sequence of a cpDNA intergene region

A phylogenetic analysis of 25 species, representing eight genera of theRubieae tribe (Rubiaceae), has been made using the DNA sequence of the chloroplastatp B-rbc L intergene region. Six tropical genera from other tribes ofRubiaceae have been used as outgroups. Whatever the method of analysis (distance, parsimony or maximum likelihood), five groups are clearly separated and described as informal clades. Their relative relationships are not clearly resolved by the parsimony analysis, resulting in eight equally parsimonious trees, 327 steps long, with a consistency index (CI) of 0.749 (excluding uninformative sites). TheRubieae tribe appears monophyletic from the data available. Some new and partly unexpected phylogenetic relationships are suggested. The genusRubia forms a separate clade and appears to be the relatively advanced sister group of the remaining taxa. TheSherardia clade also includes the generaCrucianella andPhuopsis. Galium sect.Aparinoides appears closely attached to theAsperula sect.Glabella clade. The remaining taxa ofGalium are paraphyletic:Galium sect.Platygalium (in theCruciata clade) is linked to the advanced generaCruciata andValantia; the more apomorphic groups ofGalium form theGalium sect.Galium clade, including the perennial sectionsGalium, Leiogalium, andLeptogalium as well as the annual (and possibly polyphyletic) sect.Kolgyda.     

cpDNA intergene sequences corroborate restriction site data for reconstructingRubiaceae phylogeny

Representatives of seven genera from five tribes ofRubiaceae have been compared in respect to a non-coding intergene cpDNA region of about 1000 bp, situated between the atpB and the rbcL genes. The resulting most parsimonious PAUP cladogram corresponds very well with one based on total cpDNA restriction site data obtained byBremer & Jansen (1991). The two different molecular analyses thus corroborate each other and contribute to an improved systematic arrangement of the large family, e.g., in respect to placing the tribeHedyotideae clearly into the subfamilyRubioideae, closer toRubieae than toPsychotrieae.     

Restriction fragment length polymorphisms of the phytohemagglutinin genes inPhaseolus andVigna (Leguminosae)

Restriction fragment length polymorphisms at the phytohemagglutinin (PHA) locus were determined among 21 genotypes ofPhaseolus vulgaris, P. coccineus, P. acutifolius, P. lunatus, and threeVigna species, using five restriction enzymes and one double digestion, in order to provide molecular evidence for their genetic relatedness. The dissimilarity between genotypes was estimated from binary RFLP data. The dissimilarity was high among species (from 0.75 to 0.95), and of variable extent among genotypes of the same species (0.33–0.89). InP. vulgaris, two different DNA hybridization patterns were found, giving further evidence for two major gene pools in that species. The restriction patterns ofP. vulgaris var.aborigineus, the putative ancestral form ofP. vulgaris, exhibit clear homology toP. vulgaris genotypes. An undefined landrace from Taiwan could be identified as aP. vulgaris genotype. RFLP-based trees for the phytohemagglutinin genes of the species studied were computed with several distance matrix and parsimony methods.     

Systematic classification of Asian colobines

In order to study the differentiation of Asian colobines, fourteen variables were analysed in one way, on 123 skulls, includingRhinopithecus, Presbytis, Presbytiscus, Pygathrix, andNasalis with both cluster and differentiated functions tests. Information on paleoenvironment changes in China and South-East Asia since late Tertiary have been used to examine the influences of migratory habits and the distribution range in Asian colobines. The cladogram among different Asian colobines genera was made from the results of various analysis. Some new points or revisions were suggested: 1. Following the second migratory way, ancient species of Asian colobines perhaps passed through Xizang along the northern bank of Tethis sea and Heng-Duan Shan regions, across Yunnan into Vietnam, since the ancient continent between Yunnan and Xizang was already located in on eastern bank of Tethis sea. Thus, during the evolution, Asian colobines must have had two original centres, i.e. “Sundaland” and Heng-Duan Shan Chinese regions; 2. Pygatrix possesses a lot of cranial features more similar toPresbytiscus than toRhinopithecus. The small difference from the modification combinesPygatrix with other two genera as shown by Groves (1970), but it is better to putPygatrix andPresbytiscus together as one genus; 3.Nasalis (2n=48) may be the most primitive genus within Asian colobines. Some features shared withRhinopithecus, for example body size, terrestrial activities, limb proportion etc. ...seem to be considered as a common inheritance of symlesiomorphus characters; 4.Rhinopithecus, with reference to cranioface and cranium or to its origin, is a special genus of Asian colobine. It may represent the highest level of evolutionary position within various genera (Peng et al., 1985).     

Molecular phylogeny in the Lardizabalaceae

Eleven species belonging to seven genera in the Lardizabalaceae were analyzed in terms of restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) of chloroplast DNA and the sequence of the chloroplast gene,rbcL, of Lardizabalaceae and its related families. Phylogenetic trees inferred from parsimony, neighbor joining and maximum likelihood methods based on RFLP data showed that two South American genera,Boquila andLardizabala, and three East Asian genera,Akebia, Holboellia andStauntonia are closely related to each other, respectively. On the other hand, the parsimony, neighbor joining and maximum likelihood trees constructed using sequence data of therbcL gene showed thatAkebia, Stauntonia, Boquila andLardizabala clustered as(((Akebia, Stauntonia), Boquila), Lardizabala). This difference may be attributable to fewer informative sites inrbcL genes than in RFLP in this family.Decaisnea diverges at the very base of the Lardizabalaceae.     

Chloroplast DNA variation inDesmodium subgenusPodocarpium (Leguminosae): Infrageneric phylogeny and infraspecific variations

Chloroplast DNA (cpDNA) restriction site variation was examined in five species ofDesmodium subgenusPodocarpium (Leguminosae; Papilionoideae; Desmodieae). Twenty four phylogenetically informative cpDNA mutations were scored. The cladistic analysis of characters based on the 24 mutations resulted in the most parsimonious tree which supports the monophyly of the subgenus.Desmodium elegans of subgenusDollinera was the sister group of subgenusPodocarpium in this tree. The groupings obtained from the cpDNA characters were consistent with the present infrageneric classification system for the subgenus except for the infraspecific taxa ofD. podocarpum. Three groups withinD. podocarpum, which were incongruent with the infraspecific classification of the species, were distinguished by a total of four site mutations. The first group consisted of subsp.podocarpum, subsp.fallax, and subsp.oxyphyllum var.oxyphyllum; the second subsp.oxyphyllum var.oxyphyllum; and the last subsp.oxyphyllum var.oxyphyllum and var.mandshuricum.     

Relationship between chimpanzee Rh-like genes and the R-C-E-F blood group system

The antigenic closeness between the chimpanzee alloantigen R^c of the R-C-E-F system, and the human alloantigen Rh_o(D) suggests a phylogeconnection between their genes. To confirm at the molecular level the common origin of these genes, genomic DNA from 16 unrelated chimpanzees of various R-C-E-F phenotypes were digested by three restriction enzymes and analyzed by Southern blot using a human Rh cDNA probe and three exon-specific probes. Restrictions profiles displayed reach polymorphism. Correlations between some bands and certain R-C-E-F phenotypes demonstrate that the human Rh cDNA probe defines in chimpanzee genomic DNA some genes of the R-C-E-F system.     

Archiascomycetes: detection of a major new lineage within the Ascomycota

For phylogenetic analysis of the higher fungi, we sequenced the nuclear small subunit rRNA (18S rRNA) gene fromTaphrina populina, the type species of the genusTaphrina, andProtomyces lactucae-debilis. The molecular phylogeny inferred from these 2 sequences and 75 sequences from the DNA data bank divided the Ascomycota into three major lineages: the hemiascomycetes, the euascomycetes, and the archiascomycetes, newly described herein. The former two lineages are monophyletic, whereas the archiascomycetes, which originated first and are comprised ofTaphrina, Protomyces, Saitoella, Schizosaccharomyces, andPneumocystis, may not be monophyletic. Among the archiascomycetes, theTaphrina/Protomyces branch is monophyletic. Confirmation of the archiascomycetes as a monophyletic taxonomic class will require comparison of additional genetically defined characters.This work was supported in part by grants 05454030 from the Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture of Japan (to J. S.) and 4369 from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Fellowship Programs (to H. N.).