DOI 10.1016/j.sajb.2021.06.015 The brown algal genus Lobophora (Dictyotales, Phaeophyceae) is an important ecological component of tropical marine systems. Although still scantily sampled, 35 species of Lobophora were discovered previously from the western Indian Ocean. This study updates previous diversity estimates by incorporating recent collections from Madagascar, Mozambique, and the Red Sea, considerably improving our knowledge of Lobophora diversity and biogeography in this region. Eight additional species are identified from the western Indian Ocean, raising the total number of Lobophora species to 43. Fifteen species are new to science and described herein. With ca. 40% of the global diversity, the western Indian Ocean is second only to the Central Indo-Pacific. Of the species identified to date, 29 appear to be restricted to the western Indian Ocean, three are shared with the Atlantic (four including L. lessepsiana introduced to the western Mediterranean Sea) and 12 have a wider distribution in the Indo-Pacific. The western Indian Ocean supports a high diversity with ca. 67% of its Lobophora restricted to this region, which is comparable to the Central Indo-Pacific (62%) and the Caribbean (61%). The presence of several putative endemic species in the western Indian Ocean islands and the Red Sea illustrates that these provinces played an important role in Lobophora species diversification within the western Indian Ocean by producing locally new species. The small number of species shared between the western Indo-Pacific and Atlantic indicates that this oceanic boundary – associated with the temperate Agulhas marine province, and the Benguela current and upwelling – acts as an effective dispersal barrier.
Madagascar, Mozambique molecular phylogenetics, Red Sea, seaweeds, South Africa, taxonomy
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Publisher's official version | 17 | 8 Mo | ||
Table A.1. Voucher information and GenBank accession data for material of Lobophora from the western Indian Ocean used in this study. In bold the specimens sequenced in this study. | - | 41 Ko | ||
Table A.2. Voucher and GenBank accession data for additional specimens used for phylogenetic analyses. | - | 20 Ko | ||
Fig. A.1. Specimen-level phylogenetic tree of the genus Lobophora based on cox3 sequences, reconstructed with Bayesian method. Numbers at nodes indicate posterior probabilities. Six species did not .. | 1 | 1 Mo | ||
Fig. A.2. Specimen-level phylogenetic trees of the genus Lobophora based on psbA sequences (1000 bp), reconstructed with Bayesian (A) and maximum likelihood methods (B). | 1 | 1 Mo | ||
Fig. A.4. Lobophora species tree based on the concatenated cox3, psbA and rbcL sequences (3100 bp), reconstructed with Bayesian method. Numbers at nodes indicate posterior probabilities. | 1 | 1 Mo | ||
Fig. A.5. Photographs of Lobophora spp. from the western Indian Ocean. Habit photographs of Lobophora flabellata from Mozambique forming large patches (A); L. isselii from Antsiranana Bay, Madagascar, | 1 | 783 Ko | ||
Author's final draft | 51 | 4 Mo |
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