Comparative Phylogeography of Vicariant Species of the Daphnia longispina s.lat. Complex (Crustacea: Cladocera) in Northern Eurasia

This study presents new data on the population-genetic polymorphism, phylogeny, and phylogeography of two vicariant species belonging to the Daphnia longispina s.lat. complex (Crustacea: Cladocera) in northern Eurasia, D. longispina s.str. and D. dentifera. Based on the variability of the fragments of noncoding 12S rRNA and the protein coding ND2 genes of mitochondrial DNA, the demographic processes that took place in populations of this vast region have been reconstructed. The previously suggested hypothesis about the different demographic history of the Siberian and European D. longispina s.str. clades has not been confirmed, since we first revealed a deep mitochondrial divergence within the Siberian clade. Moreover, a new divergent D. longispina s.str. lineage in Siberia has been identified. Nevertheless, the phylogeographic patterns of D. longispina s.str. and D. dentifera in northern Eurasia confirm the earlier conclusion that repeated, combined effects on their populations of dispersion and vicariate events occurred in different phases of the Pleistocene.